lostcarnival | ⇨ THE LUNAR SOLSTICE

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⇨ 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

"I hide it pretty good, so how could ya know?" She pulls her hand away and winces. It's still cold and wet, the skin feels like it's pulling tighter over her face than is usual. "Hey Ginko, can we go inside? 'M real cold now."

"Fair enough."

He nods, his shoulders slumping - then pulls the scarf from around his neck and offers it to her. Even if she's already pretty bundled up, maybe it can help some. "Let's go."

She takes the scarf and wraps it around her face-- though she'd have to wrap it all the way around her eyes to make it really worth it, but she makes do with what she has. Doll also takes the opportunity to take Ginko's hand again, looking very contrite about her earlier outburst.

"Hot chocolate, yeah? Then um. If ya. Wanted ta make sure m'eye's okay..."

Ginko's fingers curl, just slightly, around Doll's, and with that he's ready to keep making their way back to the cabin.

"Yeah. And..." He hesitates, glancing over at her. "Sure, if that's alright with you."

He would like to be totally sure she's not injured, but... it's seeming like she's probably not. So, if she's not comfortable showing him, he doesn't want to push.

They walk for a few feet in silence, mostly because Doll is chewing over what she wants to say. Another apology maybe? The whole story right now? No, there are so many people around, someone would see Ginko looking at her face and ask questions. Maybe she just changes her mind, says she's feeling just fine and they go on having a nice afternoon with hot chocolate and watching the snow.

Instead:

"I showed Tamaki. 'Sides him, 'n Joker, nobody else has seen it. It's real bad, Ginko, ya don' have ta look."

He glances down at her with his good eye - and, at the moment, he's very much more aware than usual of the hollow space hidden behind his eye patch. "Chances are, I've seen worse. I'm not concerned about that so much as whether you want me to see it."

Another thought occurs to him, and he hesitates for a moment before voicing it. "...I've never told you why I wear this eye patch, have I?"

"'S not what it looks like," she says quietly. "'S what happened in th'first place." Doll grips Ginko's hand hard and squeezes her eye shut. Somehow, the memory of the cold from the snow and the burning heat are coming together, making her wince.

She's glad when Ginko gives her something else to think about, and Doll looks up at the eye patch curiously. Given what they're talking about, she'd be the last one to think about why people wear eye patches-- if she could wear an eye patch she would. Smile wore an eye patch, she remembers, and he told them it was because of an accident. But in reality it had covered... something else. A glowing mark.

"Yer... not a pirate?" she asks with an awkward little titter. "I thought... it mighta been from an accident'r somethin'."

Ginko can't think of anything he could say that would be a sufficient answer to that. So, instead of speaking, he just squeezes Doll's hand gently. He doesn't doubt that whatever happened must have been awful, but there's no way it will be more unpleasant for him to hear about it than for her to remember it.

"No, I'm not. Sorry to disappoint." He allows himself a faint smile as he continues - though it gets a little more wistful as he goes on. "Honestly, I... can't say for sure how it happened. All I know is that, sometime before I can remember, something... happened to that eye."

He's quiet a moment before adding, "I actually used to cover it up with my hair, too, but that doesn't work too well anymore." He taps the base of one of his curved horns, where it pushes his bangs apart, with his free hand.

"Mm..." she nods, looking up at his horns and gauging that yes, the split in his hair is rather inconvenient. "I dunno what I'd do if I had horns like yours." Doll reaches up and pulls on her own little antlers, letting her head rock back and forth as she does. "Least these don' get too much in th'way 'a things."

They keep walking for a bit, Doll wondering what could have happened to Ginko's eye that he couldn't remember. It should have been an intense enough thing to remember, right? But maybe there was no pain... Doll only remembers the pain, honestly.

"Joker, ah. Joker'n me don' have th'same parents. Y'know that, righ'? When I was real small, he took me in when I had nobody. But he's more family ta me than my mum and da were.

"I ah. They didn' like it when I got in the way. They didn' like it when I cried from bein' hungry. When they didn' see me, it was jus' better. I spent a lotta time outside, followin' Joker 'round cause his hair was so pretty," she says with a chuckle. "Never seen nobody with red hair before, ya know. He was special. Always made me laugh."

Those are the bits she likes to remember. Doll following him around, reaching to be picked up and carried, trying to follow him even after he told her to go home. And she was too young to tell him why she didn't want to go home.

"I don' remember what happened, why she got so mad, but th'last time I saw my mum... th'stove was hot, she was yelling at me, grabbing me, an' I tried ta get away so she musta... thought I needed ta learn."

"I'm sure you'd figure something out. But, hopefully it won't come to that."

Truth be told, Ginko hadn't really thought of the possibility that Joker and Doll might not be related by blood - but he doesn't say anything, instead just listening to Doll quietly. As she goes on, though-- as she explains what happened, how she got scarred, Ginko's eye goes wide, a little at a time.

"...I'm sorry." He really wishes he could be more shocked by the thought that someone would do that to their own child - to any child. But... he can't be surprised. He just hates to think that it happened to Doll.

"And Joker took care of you after that?"

"Yeah!" Doll's voice sounds thin and wet, but she's clearly bolstered by the conversation turning to Joker. It's hard for her to repeat this, she's never had to tell anybody before-- her siblings just... knew. And with everybody else she was never close enough to have these kinds of conversations so freely.

"Joker found me th'next day, took me to a church. The sisters there were real nice, tried their best ta help, 'n at least I didn't die from it, but..." But there was nothing to be done for her face. "He made sure I got all the way better. Him 'n Beast, 'n Jumbo, 'n Dagger, 'n Wendy 'n Peter. An' I'm alright, even now I'm alright.

"But it's odd, ain' it?" she says with another off chuckle. "Dolls are pretty things, 'n perfect. But that's what Joker wanted ta call me, so..."

He'd hoped that moving to talking about Joker might help, so it's nice to hear that it seems to have worked.

He tilts his head, though, one ear lifting upward as he considers that last comment. "...I don't think it's odd at all, actually. Dolls are supposed to bring people comfort, and happiness, aren't they? You're pretty good at that."

Doll stops walking, still holding Ginko's hand, looking up at him as though he's told her some incomprehensible secret. It's big, and hard to wrap her head around, but it seems to open some door in her she hadn't figured out yet.

"I do that?"

...You know, despite everything, it's kind of surprising to hear she didn't realize that. It's so obvious to him, and, he's sure, to everyone else around her. But... then, he guesses that's how these things go sometimes.

"Of course. If you don't believe me, you can ask... well, anyone who knows you, I'd guess." He smiles, just slightly. "We're all really lucky to have you around."

Doll continues to look at him in awe, but she doesn't argue it. She can't think of somebody who doesn't like her-- she's pretty sure nobody has said anything negative towards her. Maybe he's right. Maybe anybody would say that.

After another moment, she smiles, wide and pink-cheeked, up at him. "'M lucky ta have you around ta tell me that."

And, for some reason, that surprises him. It's not exceptionally visible - just a slight lift of his ears and eyebrows.

"Uh... no problem. Wouldn't say it if it wasn't true."

Doll's smile stretches a little wider and she keeps one walking, gently swinging her and Ginko's hands as they walk.

"I knew somebody who wore an eye patch ya know. His name was Sm--. Smile," she says, deciding against using his real name for the moment. "His eye, he said he lost it in an accident, but I saw him once without his patch. It... it glowed pink. Is that what yer eye is like...?"

Ginko raises his eyebrows a little further hearing that, but gives a small shake of his head. "Glowing... no, nothing like that. Actually, the eye itself is entirely gone."

Yep. Just... gone.

"Oh..." Doll tries to imagine that and feels a little awkward and squirmy in her stomach trying to picture it. "Have ya tried maybe gettin' a glass eye? Sometimes people do that."

"Had one for a while, actually. But I lost it." Which is to say, he just straight-up gave it away.

"I thought about getting a new one, but, uh... matching this eye color is pretty expensive. Besides, keeping it in was pretty uncomfortable, since it's not..." He hesitates a moment, brow wrinkling. But-- she'd told him about what happened to her, and that was clearly pretty hard for her.

So, it's only fair.

"If it were just that the eye is gone, that would be one thing. But there's, uh... there's something else in its place."

Doll looks up at Ginko with a concerned frown. Something else in it's place but the eye was totally gone...? But he could still get a glass eye in?

She looks up at their path and makes a decision-- she pulls on Ginko's hand and starts jogging the rest of the way to her cabin. It isn't too much longer, but they'd get there faster if they jogged.

Ginko blinks, somehow not expecting the pull, but speeds up to follow Doll easily enough. "--What's the rush, suddenly?"

Maybe he doesn't quite make the connection between his weirdly cryptic explanation and Doll hurrying up - or, more likely, he does, but he doesn't quite get it.

"I want ta see!" she says, like it's obvious. The sooner they got to the cabin, the sooner they could pull the curtains back, so to speak.

"Sounds a strange thing, after all. Can' blame me for bein' curious!"

"Ah-- guess not." He's... pretty sure he did a good job of stomping down any sign of nerves in his voice there. Doll would absolutely not be the first person to be curious upon hearing about the condition of his eye, but at least she's... you know, asking, and not just going to push his hair aside herself in front of everyone on the moon. Could be way worse.

Fortunately, the cabin is close enough that he doesn't have long to keep stressing about it. He pulls at his scarf once they're inside, and his tail thumps on the floor. "Do you want to get the hot chocolate first?"

He's totally not stalling. Definitely.

"'Course!"

Yes, she took that as a request, not a suggestion. But still, she happily sheds her scarf, coat, and gloves-- gets a few steps into the cabin before backtracking to pull out of her boots-- and heads for the little kitchenette.

"It's so quick, too! Who knew such a small box could be so useful?"

⇨ THE LUNAR SOLSTICE

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