lostcarnival | ⇨ HEARTSTONE MANOR

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⇨ 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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9S barely contains his snort of laughter, and manages to successfully resist the urge to salute; it seems like something that might be frowned on here? Human etiquette sure is complicated.

"Yeah, that's right."

Watching Scout adjust her sleeve -- as well as all the other carnival members stuffed into dresses -- he can only also draw the conclusion that female clothing is a whole lot more annoying to deal with.

"I'm a YoRHa Number 9 Type S model. But people usually call me 9S."

She smiles, wide mouth pulling to one side. "Seriously, what's he supposed to be riding? I'm not carrying his fat tail anywhere." Never mind that after Portland she'd carried him to the medical tent; she's going by trash-talking rules, not logic.

The corset is the worst part. During the fitting they'd tried several more severe ones on her and she'd had a hard time arguing her way out of them. Scout's not against wearing something on the elaborate side, but not when there's so much tension about, and not for an unknown number of days.

"Well, I'm Tallisibeth Enwandung-Esterhazy. My friends call me Scout," she says, deliberately imitating his introduction. "It's got nothing to do with my job here. You're some kind of a droid?"

Scout you're making it really hard for him not to laugh, and he breaks out into a series of giggles before stifling it quickly. It's not often he encounters someone who's willing to gossip about their bosses with him; as much as he likes the serious, no nonsense 2B, she really isn't one to trash talk the Commander.

Wow that name's a mouthful. He'll have to dedicate slightly more memory storage to remember that one. But hm. Is it a bit too early to call each other friends? Should he stick with "ma'am"? Her first name, maybe?

"An android, yeah." 9S is rather picky about the terminology people use to refer to him. But he doesn't give Scout as much shade as he'd given the others. "You're the first one who's gotten it right without me telling them." His voice lilts up, hopeful. "Are there androids where you're from?"

Scout smirks. She's careful about discussing the Ringmaster, and about Peridot for different reasons, but not the Nightrider.

"Usually not called androids. I think the 'an' is there to show they're made to closely resemble a living sentient species? At least out in galactic circles. They're rare, anyway." People find them creepy, and they bring up the old arguments about ethics. "Normally they're either sort of human-shaped but all metal and with more abstracted faces, or look more like your counterpart."

She glances back at 9S's companion. It's sort of like your astromech or utility type droid, sort of like a miniature probe droid, and wouldn't be cause for more than an idly curious look or two in a big city, or anywhere where people might kitbash and otherwise make custom machines.

"Oh." The androids there don't sound anything like what he is. "We're modelled after our human creators, so it would be pointless for us to look obviously metal."

It's hard to not let his disappointment show. Meeting people from all sorts of worlds, where humans exist, it had gotten him thinking. About how humans are in so many worlds, but androids are not. About the necessity of the existence of androids when humans still exist in vast numbers.

9S follows Scout's gaze to Pod 153. He doesn't bother keeping his next words quiet; if any servants are listening in, he wants them to hear it.

"That's Pod 153." He keeps his voice and manner casual. "It takes care of my maintenance at night, so it has to come with me."

"Huh. Well, in civilization people like droids that sometimes look sort of like them, but not all the way. Not just like humans. The battle droids Genosians design look like Genosians without wings, the Colicoids make droideka that walk on several legs and roll up like they do, so on." She picks up that he's not happy about what she's said, but doesn't really get why. "Androids that look like their creators exist, they're just a real minority."

Usually they're used in espionage, or as body doubles, or for creepy, unsavory things. Scout doesn't know a whole lot. The Confederacy had gone for mass produced droids made by insectoid species, mostly.

"I see." She supposes he's worried it would get tampered with or opened up if he left it in assigned quarters. Maybe it's concealing weapons, that'd be pretty smart. "Hi, Pod 153? I guess?"

Pod 153 does indeed come with weaponry. Not all of it, because the Ringmaster doesn't like guns. But still enough to be a danger.

9S smiles at that. How cute, she's treating Pod 153 as if it were an actual sapient being.

"It won't respond to you." Because it's assigned to him, and because he ordered it to stay silent for the duration of the stay unless ordered otherwise. He doesn't want the Prince or any of the staff to realise Pod 153 is smarter than it looks. "It's a simple 'droid'. It doesn't think the way me and you do. It has one job and that's it."

Blatantly lying about what Pod 153 is capable of to his own team? Yeah. It's fine, he'll clue her in later, when the Nightriders figure a place they can speak more freely. Then he can ask Scout for the help he really wants from her.

"But, uh. The Genosians and Colicoids... they're aliens right? From space."

A being, but nothing like an equal. She shrugs. "We've got a lot like those. If something's just going to do the same boring things over and over, it'd be cruel if it could think much past them."

She is not thinking that he could be lying. There are elaborate classifications of machine intelligence back in the galaxy, far away, but Scout's never really been into the topic.

Scout laughs, quietly enough that it doesn't worry the servants. "Everyone's from space! I'm from space. You're from space. But yes, aliens are normal. I probably have Vorzydiak ancestry myself." Not like she's ever been able to ask.

That startles 9S visibly. "You're part alien?"

He manages to keep his usual expression of disgust at the mention of aliens off his face, but something in his face twitches all the same. Ugh, aliens! What good did they do anybody? Well, as long as they aren't like the aliens back home, or like the Gems.

...Yeah, he kind of has been avoiding dealing with Peridot completely.

Carefully, he asks, "You're not, um. Vorzydiak because they invaded and took over your home, are you?"

Scout narrows her eyes at him, and folds her arms as best she can with these terrible giant sleeves in the way, her tail making a sharp curve near the tip. She caught something of that, the surprise and then the flinch after it.

"Are you going to go all Imperial propaganda on me? You have to tell me nice and early on so I can do it right back at you, because buddy, I have so much more of a leg to stand on than you do." The Clone Wars set droid rights efforts back by hundreds of years and the new Empire is only too happy to go along with it. "There's nothing special about humans beyond being everywhere and the most numerous species in the galaxy. And spawning a million offshoots. Vorzydiakians among them."

On a genetic level, even if she was entirely Vorzydiak, which she isn't, if you ignored the fae changes she'd be human. Just, an odd expression of human that resulted in wider eyes, a more yellowy green skin tone, and antennae.

9S has no idea what the heck Imperial propaganda even is. But aside from the insult to her own race -- he can't believe he just heard 'there's nothing special about humans' from a human! -- his processors are stuck on that last bit. That the alien Vorzydiakians came from humans. And hey, if there's such thing as part human and part alien people, clearly human alien relations are in a good state there. And he has no problem with that, since their aliens are a species of humans, as far as he's concerned.

In a way, it's almost a relief to hear all that; it just goes to show that humans are the best.

9S brightens considerably, despite Scout's expression. "Incredible! Humans are that widespread in your world? I'm really happy to hear that." His gaze slides away, a little sheepish. "Sorry, I thought you were like the aliens from home. They're the reason we androids have been locked in war for thousands of years."

She would be frustrated to hear that chain of thought. Some of Scout's closest friends have been aliens that only coincidentally, convergently resembled humans in any way. She was raised not to worry about it, to know their differences but celebrate all their similarities.

Resigned, she says, "Worlds, Niney. Plural worlds. We're scattered across the whole galaxy, but so are Twi'leks and Duros and Sullustans and just, tons more. None of those are human offshoots and it's fine, when we fight it's almost never just on species lines. I am sorry to hear about the war, though."

Even a handful of years of galactic war was awful. Confining conflict to one planet and stretching it out sounds like first, bad, and second, incredibly tedious. She knows that's some terrible, callous phrasing, but it's fine, she's not saying it out loud.

If she had said his war sounds tedious aloud, 9S honestly would agree with her.

The fighting never is started on species lines, just aliens being assholes, as far as 9S is concerned.

"It's alright." He flashes Scout a confident grin. "It's only a matter of time, now that us YoRHa androids have been rolled out."

9S stays silent the androids' end aim for the war. Aside from the eradication of the machines, they want to transform Earth to the state it was before the last remnants of humanity fled to the moon, so the humans can make their glorious return to their home, Earth. If Scout is so used to humans 'being everywhere', then she might not react so well to the news that humans have almost been entirely eradicated in his world. Rita hadn't taken to the news very well, so...

"But um. 9E's kinda weird for a nickname. There's no Type E model." He's never heard of one ~~at his canon point~~. "If you want, you can call me Nines. That's what I was called by people who knew me well back home."

She's heard that kind of thing before. Scout shrugs. "Hope so."

"All right, Neens." What's the point in giving someone a nickname that isn't at least a bit silly, thinks Scout. "And again, I'm Scout."

By now the servants who'd been particularly close by have moved off a little ways, and she thinks she can talk without being overheard if she keeps it down. "I think a lot's happened here, but no big, specific good or bad things. I can pick up on those, at least that they've happened."

Despite everything, 9S' expression flatlines. 'Neens'? Somehow, that's even worse?? Why are humans like this. Yet, he can't bring himself to protest this one. If. If that's what a human is going to call him, he'll. Deal with it... He'll deal with it...

Maybe.

"Hm. Maybe that's why the Ringmaster's on edge?" At least, that's the impression he's getting from everyone else's reaction to her announcements. How is Scout doing that? Is this some weird magic thing that so many of the Nightriders have? He'll have to ask later, when they're not in enemy territory. "I'm not picking up anything myself, but my sensors are better equipped for detecting what's physically here now."

She grins into his face. Yes. 'Neens' it is. She just hopes this won't end as badly as things had at various points with Scuffy - Solis, rather.

"Yeah, I've never seen her like this, and I've been here a long time. Either she really is on edge and this really is important, or she's decided to mess with everyone and there's just a bet going on that we'll behave or not." Scout makes a face. "I'm not going to hold my breath for the second one."

Nooo...

9S pulls away slightly, shoving his hands into his pockets and pouting a little. "I was thinking the same thing. We better be on our best behaviour, huh? What a pain."

Giving Scout a sidelong glance, he schools his expression into one of mild surprise.

"Hold on, it looks like you've got something caught in one of your sleeves." There's absolutely nothing caught in it. He just needs her to hold out her arm. "Let me have a look at it."

She's not entirely unsympathetic, and she smiles, but she shakes her head. "You sound like a ten-year-old. Careful saying that kind of thing."

"No I d- oh, yeah." Her slightly affronted look - she knows what's happening with her own clothing! - relaxes. "Uh, I think a thread might be coming loose inside?"

Scout winces. That's the kind of thing where if one of the servants heard it'd probably be their cue to come in and repair it.

He's not even sure what 'like a ten year old' is even supposed to mean. He's three, but it's not like he goes through a period of uselessness that humans apparently built their societies around accommodating.

9S steps closer, peering at the sleeve. "Hold still for a bit, will you?" With that, he reaches into her sleeve. His hands hidden by the fabric, he slips a folded piece of paper into her hand. While he's close, he says quietly, "It's a blank map."

Pulling away, he smiles, hand held up. "There we go." There's nothing between his fingers, but it would be hard to tell even from a short distance away. Closing his hand into a fist, he shoves it back into his pockets. "Better?"

Her sleeve could hide a moderately-sized child. It's absurd. She's going to have to find a place to tuck the paper now, and whoever designed this habit never thought to give it pockets.

Not his fault though. "Yeah, I think so." She doesn't glance about openly, but her attention flicks around them. They're watched, but not closely she thinks, and it's dicey if they're being overheard or not. At a normal talking volume, probably.

"Got an idea," she murmurs without moving her lips, as quietly as she can manage. "Can you knock something over and make it look like an accident? Quietly? I wanna see if something works." She's already seen that while the servants are quick to right things that have ended up on the ground they don't seem perturbed by accidents of that nature.

More loudly she says, "At least the art's nice. Do you think they're just sort of magic, or someone made them?"

At Scout's request, he murmurs, "Brass light to your right, in 3 seconds."

He's talking about the small lamp.

Which gently falls over as they pass by it after she makes the comment about the art. It isn't magic he's using, but small part of his magnetic field, condensed into a small enough point that it can be tossed as a teeny tiny near invisible force. Normally it's functionally useless -- a machine isn't even going to flinch from a force that small -- but it's strong enough to at push the lamp over. Barely.

"Hmm. Well, even if it's made of magic, it still needs a caster, doesn't it? So it's still created by someone."

Edited 2017-10-12 12:18 (UTC)

Three seconds? That's barely enough time, and Scout frowns at nothing, focusing. The Ringmaster gave her something that resembles certain advanced Force-based techniques but is functionally a glamour that she can shift so that some people can see through it.

But this isn't enough time to tailor it, so as the lamp wobbles and starts to tip... what lamp? There's nothing there. There may have been small sound like something hit the nice rug. It's not that the lamp is invisible or inaudible so much as it's made unnoticeable, or nearly. Just not important. You'd step over or around it rather than tripping on it, probably.

Servants don't react, but then, none of them or the guests was right by the lamp and would've been looking. Scout blinks, makes her features relax. "Uh, so, artist-magicians, huh? I wonder if they've got to go over every detail like someone working with their hands, or the magic can act like a computer. Fill these parameters."

9S watches out of the corner of his eyes.

Huh. Interesting.

So this must be what she was talking about to Lambert over the Nightrunner channel. Nice. He'd been intending to ask her about it. Now if the servants could drift a little further away...

"Hm. Maybe." He brings his hand to his chin in thought. "It might turn out better than anything generated mechanically. Some androids tried creating art, but there's just something... missing. Maybe computer generated art lacks the spark of creativity humans have."

Edited 2017-10-12 13:24 (UTC)

Once she's hidden something, Scout doesn't have any more difficulty maintaining the glamour that conceals it. One day, she hopes, this will be useful indeed.

"I wouldn't know. Never had the chance to take more than a few courses on art, and none of them were heavy on philosophy." The war had dramatically changed the curriculum of Jedi apprentices and then, of course, had come the end of the war. "But you know, aliens absolutely make great art. It's usually pretty different, humans can't appreciate paint in the ultraviolet spectrum without assistance, but pretty much every species has creative people in it."

She's willing to believe it's very rare in droids. They're droids.

9S scrunches his face. Ew. Aliens, creating art? He could see it for the human descended ones, maybe. Those machines, as crazy as they were, had described their alien creators like plants. Mentally dead. No offence to Syrlya.

"Hm. If you say so. I'd have to see it for myself to know."

That's a neutral enough answer, right?

He drops his voice to a whisper. "Hey, how long can you that stealth up?"

Edited 2017-10-12 13:43 (UTC)

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