⇨ JAILHOUSE ROCKS

[ringleaders]

Who: Everyone who IS imprisoned, brainwashed, or infiltrating.
When: Day 175, 11:30PM onward.
Where: The Prince's shiny new fortress.
What: Those that have been imprisoned by the Prince languish in their underground cell, while those that are under his control continue to do his nasty bidding. Also, Foster might be here? We'll see how that goes.
Warnings: General fuckery, maybe torture.

THE LAIR OF THE BEAST↴ As the fortress comes into being, the Prince has been reaching far across his realm, beckoning his servants back to him and corralling as many helpless hostages as he can manage. In the case of the unfortunate carnival members who made the mistake of crossing him during their stay, they are being locked away in the most secure inner sanctums, held as collateral against their former master. Those freshly captured haven't yet been bent to his will, but they can certainly be neutralized. Carted away by security and pulled deep underground, there feels like there is little hope of them escaping on their own. ► GROUNDED: The Prince's dungeon is a simple one - in place of cages and manacles, there is only natural stone. A claustrophobic cave somewhere deep in the earth, those within it will soon be completely cut off from the outside world. All the prisoners will have been injected with manticore venom at some point or another, which will be slowly turning parts of their bodies to stone, and if that wasn't enough they have also been partially encased in the stone walls and pillars, as if phased halfway into the rock and left there in various positions. It is an enclosed area, and all the prisoners are within talking distance of each other - which is a good thing, because there isn't a lot else to do with their powers mostly bound and their bodies becoming less and less capable of movement. ► CONTROLLED: Those of the brainwashed that manage to return to the fortress will be set to work guarding and attending to these hostages, along with the help of some of the long term Manor servants. They still need to eat, right, and that can be difficult when you arms are stuck in a cave wall. Otherwise, there may come a time when the Prince calls upon them to do something more specific - and there's also the chance that the new prisoners will fall victim to his power and succumb to his control as well. With the poison in their bodies, it's only a matter of time before they lose themselves.

Comments

[whattaprick]

Telling Foster to focus is going to do jack shit, based on previous experience, but he's audibly fraying, and that's just no good if Lambert wants to get as much information as he can out of him as he can.

"Fae seem like they keep pretty good track of their belongings. Like a kid who gets their toys taken away from them," Lambert says dryly. That could apply to the Ringmaster and the Prince both in equal measure right now, though the "toys" in question are markedly different. His most important questions have been answered, he supposes; there's nothing he can imagine Foster has to contribute that would change his plans (or lack thereof) significantly.

"Take your time, Foster. It's not like we're in a rush." Since the man's so obviously struggling with ... whatever. Sleep deprivation, Lambert guesses, among everything else that's just ... him.

[otoko]

It may not be a short memory, but there is at least a sort of 'innocent ignorance' at play, not at all unlike when he was dealing with Sherlock. Why would someone be imprisoned as a traitor, why would a 'traitor' have helped obtain such an item for the Carnival-in his own mind the answer is that they aren't a traitor so much as one who failed enough that being a traitor is a fitting punishment, but Gongenzaka wisely keeps from going down that path as the other snaps.

Instead, for now, the best option is to agree with Lambert, to continue getting answers...eventually. "Aauh. It is as they have said... ....If you need, perhaps sleep, or even food when it comes...is better than explanations..." Do they have the time, the luxury for such things? Probably not. But a scattered answer is just as bad as none, really.

[criticallyfucked]

"Food?" Foster echoes. "Food?"

He tries to swallow and fails.

"That went so well for you, didn't it? Eating." He starts to laugh. Then he suddenly reverses his position with a viciousness. "Fuck food. I don't--I don't deserve to eat, to... to live." He's so vehement that speaking produces a large bubble of spit, thankfully much less visible inside of a dark cave than it would have been otherwise.

He goes quiet for a minute or two after this. It's a measure of time that restores a bit of organisation to him, internally--time during which he starts to recall all the things he didn't say, the details he wanted but couldn't recover because he was trying to think and speak and cohere.

Every thought is heavier now, though. He's starting to lose his rush, his wakefulness. On the one hand, that means the has pressure ebbed, and those impenetrable doors inside of him unlock again. On the other...

"....toys. Haha. Yes.... too bad." Too bad for the Prince, and too bad for the Ringmaster. His audience, however, was lucky to be such toys. To be so privileged, and yet so ungrateful.

It only now occurs to him to describe it, what he saw. This is just about the first chance he's had to really go back over what happened--in a way, his imprisonment forcing him to stop, to slow down, is giving things that he already grasped intangibly a chance to solidify.

"But still the Rose wasn't in the Ringmaster's hands... not in the Prince's, but also not hers... it was quick. He used something... other against her, a crystal." It's... pensive, but with censorious tone--like he's scolding them for not listening, maybe.

But he will not be rewarded for his worthless role, and he will not be allowed to rest, either--not until he finishes purging these thoughts, and fills every possible hole. Then he can finally sleep, and ultimately die.

[whattaprick]

The quiet's a good thing, much as Lambert's inclined to say something like 'we don't have time for your angst, Foster' -- because he did, after all, just say they weren't in a hurry. Down here, without any real sense of the outside world and Lambert napping intermittently as he tries to keep his strength up, it's hard to guess how long it's been. Not as long as the kidnapped were gone, he's sure of that, but...

In his ruminations, he almost misses Foster beginning to speak again. And while Lambert's followed along with the story well enough to this point, thanks to having the other bits and pieces so he saves time on asking Foster clarifying questions like 'what the fuck is the Rose,' and 'what was the Acquisitioner doing there anyway,' this bit of information is new to him.

"A crystal?" Lambert frowns. Not something Childermass must have known about, unless he was keeping that information from him, too. "Describe it to me. How did he use it against her? Was it the focus of a spell, or something else?" Foster may not necessarily be able to answer these questions, but he's just thinking out loud at this point, anyway.

[betheman]

Yes. Food. Food is important, and honestly at this point Gongenzaka is fairly certain that they can't make the situation much worse. His nose crinkles as Foster insists such things of himself however-and certainly, if he didn't think the man wasn't a traitor before, he doesn't think him as one now. Why would traitors care so much to insist what they fail to deserve? At least, those who are imprisoned with the ones they supposedly betrayed. Still, Gongenzaka can recognize someone who is entering 'deeper' thought, or at least some attempt to think at all. He remains silent, and waits. Waits for Foster to struggle through his explanations, wait for Lambert to continue...

"...If it was in neither's, then who was it who took the 'rose'?" he questions alongside Lambert, his ears twitching again.