lostcarnival | ⇨ THE PRINCE IS DEAD

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⇨ THE PRINCE IS DEAD

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 178 - B1: Day 6
Where: The Carnival and sometimes on top of the Heart of Stone.
What: Now that the Prince is dead and gone, there's a lot left to sort out. As the remaining servants are liberated and those captured by the Prince are tended to, it's time for recovery and goodbyes.
Warnings: Nothing in particular.

HOME GROUND↴

At long last, it is over. The Prince is dead, and all of his stolen Names have been restored - all that's left to do is treat the wounds and move on. For the first day or two, the Ringmaster will be arranging passage for the servants that are left, all of which have remembered their names for the first time in years. The earth elemental that had been trapped and forced to serve as the Prince's manor, the Heart of Stone, is happy to help for the moment. It appreciates the Ringmaster's mercy, and is free after untold eons of imprisonment.

Yet, there are plenty of aspects that are far from simple. There are still servants left mad and transformed into beasts, with no easy way to change them back. The Prince's spells outlive him, and those bearing his poison and his curses will have a difficult road ahead of them. Though most of the bestial servants have been rounded up, and a large number that had been reduced to unmoving statues returned, even the Ringmaster can't return them to normal so simply.

The next week is for rest and for settling remaining affairs. If you want to bid farewell to any particular NPCs, or assure care is given where it's needed, now is the time to do it.

► A CURE: The Ringmaster will tell everyone simply - there is no simple way to undo another fae's magic. The Prince's powers were essentially on par with hers, which means that those who have been transformed to stone and those that were cursed into beasts and driven insane are not something she can trivially fix. It will take the work of the carnival and a couple weeks of treatment to shed the curse of stone, and the maddened servants are an entirely separate matter. She will do what she can, but for the most part she is arranging for the Prince's servants to be cared for elsewhere. At least for now, the Ringmaster will be animating the stone portions of people's bodies with magic, though those portions will still be a bit clumsy and numb feeling.

► THE NEW HEARTSTONE: In the absence of the prince, the Heart of Stone will be taking over the remains of the Prince's realm and preventing it from collapsing into void. As it turns out, the manor had been an earth elemental all along - a form of Wyld Fae almost on par to the Prince and Ringmaster themselves. How the Heart of Stone was enslaved is a long story presumably, but the Ringmaster considers it to be a sign of the Prince's own depravity. The Heart will be allowing visitors for the first couple days of this period through the portal, but keep in mind you are essentially just walking around on its body. At least the realm has a floor, now, instead an endless abyss surrounding it.

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Tamaki matches Joker's deflection with his own, giving a shrug.

"I'm okay." Doll, at least, is an easy safety net to latch onto. "Doe-chan is... getting better. She has a hard time sleeping, though."

Her screams still echo in Tamaki's head sometimes, so loud he thought she was going to burst her vocal chords. She doesn't scream like that now, at least not that he's heard - he'll have to stay closer to her, just in case. She absolutely can't be alone right now.

"If it's okay, I was going to sleep with her tonight..." A beat, and then his mind catches up with what he said, and he blushes. "Not like that, though."

To hear that his family, any one of them, are hurting has always hurt Joker in turn. To hear that his precious little sister is hurting, from an event he could have kept her from, is... Joker can't hide the way he flinches, mouth twisting into a grimace.

If only he could be more help to her... But his leg keeps him from moving too much, and the poison has left him in no position to really help. Frankly, he supposes if he tried, then people would be all over him fussing. That'd be the opposite of helpful.

Even as he's twisting in on himself in his head to figure out how to help.... Tamaki's request has him blink upwards in surprise. Sleep together? What... And then that blush gets recognized, and oh boy. It's been a long while now since Joker has been able to grin in such a perfect Cheshire Cat manner. "Oh~? Now ya wouldn't be havin' any untoward thoughts towards my little sister, would ya?"

Edited 2017-11-28 03:56 (UTC)

"No!" he snaps, although he really is blushing harder now, and he turns away, pulling his hood a little more firmly around his face. "I just don't want her to be alone... Look, just forget what I said, okay? Forget it!"

At least this isn't a chatroom, with a permanent record of what he said there for all to see, but Joker is still going to know! Who knew liking someone could be such a field of landmines?

"I just want Doe-chan to be happy."

"Now now..." Ignoring Feathers' disapproving hoots, Joker struggles up to navigate the tricky area that is the safety net. Lots of holes and all that. He's not well enough to balance on his own in a way that lets him ruffle Tamaki's hair, so he settles instead for a poke to his back.

"I'm teasin'. Just teasin'. I want her ta be happy too." Even if, lately, it seems like he can only fuck up in that particular area. His voice goes soft. "I know what ya meant. I don't have any problems with it, alright?"

Tamaki jumps a little a the poke, then relaxes, turning to look at Joker. His hands lower from his hood, giving a better view of his face.

"...Thanks." He smiles a little, feeling better about this whole thing now. If Joker is giving his blessing, then he can go ahead with a clear conscience - not that he intended to not extend the offer to Doll, even if Joker didn't give his okay.

He reaches up and rubs the back of his hood, knocking it askew on his head. His grin turns a little bashful. "You're a nicer big brother than me. If it were Aya, I'd say no."

In the incredibly wonky way that only someone incredibly drunk or incredibly poisoned can, Joker smiles. It doesn't hang off his face quite right, but that's fine. He's sure he can be forgiven in this case.

"If I had ta say no ta every fella who came askin' after our Doll, I'd be beatin' 'em off with a stick every day of every month. Gotta say yeah at some point when I know they're good."

Tamaki isn't sure how to feel about the idea of lots of guys asking after Doll (a little jealous, maybe - but only a little!), but Joker implying he's good distracts him.

"Ah..." He grins sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head with a hand. "You really think I'm good...?"

He doesn't think he is, especially since he just helped murder Joker fairly recently. But there's more than that - he's sure he's not trusted back home, and for good reason.

"Of course ya are."

There really shouldn't be any doubt. While a little ridiculous here and there, Tamaki is a good and hardworking kid with a heart of gold. Slowly, his eyes open up into slight slits so that he can look over at the teenager.

"What, are ya fishin' for compliments?" he mutters teasingly.

"No," Tamaki says, a little bit of a pout in his voice. He's not fishing, but he wouldn't mind a compliment.

Though, Joker deserves to know this much, if he's going to give Tamaki the go ahead to be with Doll. So, without preamble, he explains.

"They don't really trust me. Back home." He shrugs. "Because, I was lazy, and I said a lot of things I didn't mean." Things like that he would quit, things like the others not being as good as him just because he debuted sooner than they did. "I did some bad stuff, too. And I've done some bad stuff here."

"Well, yer young," Joker hums, letting his eyes slide shut again. Keeping them open seems like too much trouble. Right now, at any rate. "Most folks do stupid or cruel things when they're young. Even Doll." The tooth fairy story is one he'll have to tell later, when he's feeling up to it. "S'what ya do ta make up for it that matters. And anyway..."

Ugh. To open his eyes or not open his eyes? Joker decides on the latter and keeps talking. "What things are ya talkin' about for here? Is it about the ghost thing?" Because Tamaki was a bit of a pain in the ass, too, but, hey. What happens in alternate universes stays in alternate universes.

"Eh? That wasn't even me..."

Tamaki refuses to be held accountable for the things his Portland self did. And even if he were, he feels like there's a strong argument to be made that his ghost didn't mean all those things. He was sad and scared and alone. Sometimes lashing out is all a kid knows - Tamaki's been there.

"That guy just wanted attention, anyway. But I did worse stuff." A pause, because he thinks Joker should already know this, but then he continues anyway. "Helped them hunt you down. Helped them kill you."

Another pause, and then he adds, more softly, "Sorry."

"Good." That's all Joker has to say about that. The whole thing there messed with everyone's heads who had to go through it. Even him, although he'd rather not admit that to anyone soon. Yet even if he doesn't admit it, he can't deny the affects it's had on his relationships with other people, like Sora, or seen how it's changed friends like Ginko and the Psionic.

There's no point dwelling on it, so he doesn't.... Not like he gets a chance to when Tamaki drops that, and Joker jerks up. "Wh-" Well, fuck. That was a mistake, something he quickly realizes as his vision swims and he has to jerk his hand out to regain his balance.

"Aw- hell. Tamaki, lad, ya don't- it's not yer fault. Cor, I didn't know."

When Joker suddenly jerks, Tamaki holds a hand out as though to try and help steady him, but ends up not touching him at all. He's not sure he should. After a moment, he awkwardly lowers his hand again.

But then Joker says that, and Tamaki's brows scrunch for a moment before he realizes what Joker is saying.

"Did you forget? Sorry." He probably shouldn't have reminded him of it, in that case. Would it have been better to let Joker go on not knowing that he had a hand in his death? But that feels dishonest, somehow.

"Nothin' ta apologize for." Squeezing his eyes shut, he waits for his sense of balance to come back. Well, as good as it will ever come back with the state he's in. That might take a while yet.

If he's honest... He thinks he might remember it, but not in the way he remembers anything else. It's too disjointed, coming to him in dreams where all his senses are out of whack and the world is viewed too strangely. Still, better to say nothing at all.

Honesty hurts people something bad. This he knows as a basic truth of the world.

So instead, once he's sure he won't heave or anything, he says, "If I don't remember anythin', and if it was for everyone's own good, then ya did the right thing, Tamaki. Besides... Sometimes someone dyin' is a good thing."

Tamaki frowns a bit at that, because he's not sure how someone dying can ever be a good thing, unless they're someone bad. And Joker is far from bad, in Tamaki's view.

But it did save them all in this case, even if he thinks it's sick that the Prince ever made them do something like that. So maybe it wasn't completely pointless.

"At least you don't remember much..." He doesn't remember much of his double's death in Portland anymore, either; more of the details than actually being there. He remembers enough to know it was fairly awful, though. "I guess... everything worked out alright."

"Mmm. That's right." Another flop of a pat to Tamaki. He's losing some of the energy to keep talking, but he can manage a little more. "Just... think of it like huntin' any other animal, alright? Wasn't even me."

That feels true. It wasn't the worst thing he's ever had to deal with, right?

"Okay." He frowns a little. "I think I'm done with hunting, though. Even animals."

He feels that pretty floppy pat, and sighs, moving back away from Joker a bit.

"You should go back to sleep. I'll be around."

"Good idea," comes the sleepy mutter, even as there's a loose pat to Tamaki's arm.

"An' take care of yerself." That's the most important thing. More important than him dying, or the poison.

At least, Joker thinks so.

"Mm. You too, Manager."

And then he's gone, to let Joker rest.

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⇨ THE PRINCE IS DEAD

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