lostcarnival | ⇨ THE LUNAR SOLSTICE

Who: Everyone!
When: Winter Breaks: Day 6 - Day 25
Where: THE MOON
What: The carnival journeys to one of its moons to celebrate the Lunar Solstice. More information here.
Warnings: Winter fun.

MOON WALKING↴

The journey to the moon only takes a blink of an eye, but it leaves the carnival far away beneath you. The second moon can be seen on the peripheral, massive compared to its usual view. At least when the holidays start out, there will be no notable wildlife on the moon, though this is something you can talk to the Ringmaster about if you think it needs a change. It sounds like this is the first time she's used it in quite a while - it probably needs some dusting off!

Claim your cabins, and proceed to... well, do whatever you want! There is no rush and little obligation, besides to enjoy yourself. For real, this time. She promises there will be no vampires. Or, at least, none that don't already work for the carnival.

► CABINS: Living arrangements are character choice for this event, and there are a variety of cabins of various sizes, mostly built to house 2-6 people, though you can fit more in if you squish. They are all made of wood and of a rustic design - no fancy modern furniture, here! Each building is housed with a fireplace and the needed amenities. You can pick up materials to cook with the private kitchens if you like. Theoretically, you could spend the whole holiday sequestered away, watching the snow fall. Some of them also have outdoor hot tubs available!

► ACTIVITIES: Activities are mostly going to be character driven, though there will be some large group games like bingo and maybe a poker tournament happening at some point in one of the festival halls. Otherwise, there is a lot to offer: skiing, snowboarding, hiking, ice sculpting, snowball fights - it goes on! If you'd like to run a winter activity, just let the mods know, and we will get the word out there for you.

► FEASTING: Every day isn't a full-out feast because that would get a bit unhealthy, but there will be a number of specific feast events over the holidays where everyone is encouraged to let out their inner hedonist and stuff themselves. There will be one big feast per week, with smaller but also delicious meals offered in between. The feast dates will be B12, B18, and B24. There's also plenty of alcohol available for anyone who wants it.

► SHOPPING: As mentioned in the planning post, there is a massive market being run by the World Walker Caravan! The Ringmaster has given everyone 1250 credits to spend on items, but there is a caveat - must spend at least 500 of those credits on gifts for other people. And it better be a good one, if you only buy one! (She will ask that you do not buy her presents, however. She appreciates the sentiment, but it seems sort of silly buying her things with her own money! If you'd like to gift her, please have it be something more personal or handmade, but you are not obligated to get her anything at all.)

► TREATMENTS: The beginning of the holidays will also be about the time that the emergency Medical Team will have finalized their treatments for the Prince's poisoning. Watch out for further information on that - and make sure to get treated if you are suffering from petrification or poison induced illness! The holidays will be a lot more fun that way.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

For the first time in this conversation, Strange kind of regrets that the spell goes both ways.

"They frown on both in excessive amounts, but the drugs more than the drink. One can drink a bottle a day and still be polite company." Or, at least, in Jonathan 'useless alcoholic bachelor phase' Strange's mind, one can certainly be polite company despite their mild alcoholism.

"Besides," he grumbles, "I've done more that they could frown on than simple drinking. Do you not know about my time in Venice?" Rita knows a bit about Strange's dangerous habits of ingesting poisonous plant life thanks to his actions in Portland. But Strange honestly has no idea if she knows that particular range of bad decisions is also tied to the real Strange.

"No," Rita replies simply, raising an eyebrow. Does she want to know? She's not sure, but she's just curious enough to try asking. Maybe she'll regret it, but maybe Strange will regret it more, making it somewhat worth it.

"What happened in Venice?"

"I ingested all sorts of plants and poisonous concoctions, turned a woman into a cat, went mad, got cursed, and then radically changed the landscape of English magic." It's all said in a matter of fact tone like Strange is explaining a shopping list. Strange can't help but look a little embarrassed about parts of it, but not the overall whole. After all, he couldn't go back and change any of it.

"And now you see the reason why I don't exactly care about drinking or taking certain drugs. When I eventually return to England, they'll have plenty more to chastise me over than something like the fact I smoke weed."

This is not something to be proud of. And yet, Strange can't help but look a little smug about the fact that he's a massive trainwreck.

Rita just gives him a long, blank stare. She doesn't know where to begin with any of that.

...Well, he did mention the curse and the 'radically changing English magic' bit before, so she probably doesn't need elaboration on that right now. So to choose something she's pretty sure he hasn't shared before...

"You turned a woman into a cat? Why?" He did say he could do it, but it sounds like there's a story here. Also, was he using transformation magic while under the influence? With Strange, there are times that Rita just can't believe she's talking to a grown-ass adult.

"She wanted to become one." Hold on tight Rita, we're about to go into some dumb. "It was a spell that I pieced out. We made an arrangement: I give her what she wanted, she gave me what I wanted. She wanted to become a cat, so I made her one, and I wanted to learn madness, so she gave me a vessel symbolizing hers."

Oh right, the woman was mad, did he not mention that? Strange frowns a bit before deciding that obviously he must have, why wouldn't he otherwise?

"It was a more impressive bit of magic than I'm describing it as," Strange continues, with a sigh. "It loses some of the flair in the retelling."

Yep, this sure is some dumb.

Whether or not Strange's technique sounds impressive enough is far from Rita's first concern with the story. "Why the hell would you want to learn madness? And since when is that something anybody learns, anyway?"

"In my world, there are only a few ways to reliably see the fae, even if they're trying to hide themselves from view. One of them is madness. And since what I wanted to do required a faerie's help, I needed to be able to see one at all times. And it's obviously something anybody learns because I learned it!"

How the hell is he going to answer that question, Rita? Madness can be taught because Strange was taught it, it seems like a simple enough answer in his book. Now that she's fussing at him, he can't help but get a tad defensive, scowling slightly as he continues.

"Honestly, why do you care so much with my motives?" he complains, straight up forgetting about that bond for a moment. "Can't we just talk about the magic?"

"Because I don't understand how anyone would want to have less control over their own faculties, unless they're just stupid," comes the very honest answer. "And what we use magic for is just as important as the magic itself. Doesn't your world have any concept of, I don't know, ethics in magic?"

As soon as Rita says it, she realizes there's a good chance that it doesn't, at least not in an official sense, between the general lack of magicians and all the things she read about the Raven King.

Rita's right: it straight up doesn't. "My world only has two officially recognized magicians. England barely knows what to do with magic, there aren't any ethics or laws to begin with."

Though there's plenty more magicians who aren't officially recognized. Still, you can't make laws based off of unrecognized things.

Strange is keeping quiet about the whole why he'd want to be mad thing. The answer is that love makes people dumb.

Rita runs a hand over her face. "Right... I should have guessed."

He should probably expect that to change, if there's going to be an influx of new magicians in his world. But that aside, there is one other thing he mentioned that wasn't adequately explained...

"... You said you got a 'vessel' symbolizing madness. What was it?" Rita's not sure she can take him at his word when he says madness can be learned, but maybe understanding what that was can shine some light on what he meant by that.

Strange pauses for a moment. Because really, he doesn't mind what the vessel was but he knows that Rita's going to mind what the vessel was and he honestly isn't up for yet another round of people berating him and calling him an idiot. So, Strange pauses and attempts not to answer. It works for all of five seconds before the compulsion from the agreement kicks in and Strange answers,

"A dead mouse."

Shining some light on what the vessel was probably doesn't answer any of Rita's questions and instead will probably come up with more. Strange resists the urge to pout or fuss and instead simply asks, "Why does the type of vessel matter anyway?"

Strange's answer is met with a look of absolute bewilderment. "Wh, what--"

But before Rita can finish sputtering out another question, Strange asks one of his own, and she's compelled to interrupt herself in order to answer.

"I don't know, I thought maybe it'd make the notion of learned madness make more sense, but now it actually makes less sense! What the hell would anyone want a dead mouse for!?"

"It's symbolic," Strange grumbles, as if it's somehow Rita's fault that she isn't understanding this bizarre train of logic. "If I had to choose a vessel for the madness, I'd choose something a bit more dignified. As it is, the woman wanted to become a cat, so there weren't many options to begin with."

He can feel the beginning of a headache coming on just as part of this conversation. Strange loves chatting with Rita, but talking with her means that he can't skate by on his normal, slightly half-assed, 'well it is magic what did you expect' sort of situations.

⇨ THE LUNAR SOLSTICE

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