lostcarnival | ⇨ INVASION!

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⇨ INVASION!

Who: Everyone! But especially HARBINGERS!
When: S2:D16-22
Where: All over Wismuth!
What: As the Harbingers reveal themselves, those among the carnival that Creation has chosen will start to discover new powers within themselves. It's because they're magical girls, yo.
Warnings: Harbingers being assholes.

HARBINGERS OF VOID↴

On Day 16, the Harbingers begin revealing their new selves... in the form of wreaking havoc on the city! CY-Ren isn't looking for mass panic or serious structural damage - instead she wants constant annoyances and distractions, of the sort that will keep those that might be on her tail distracted from her true plans. However, when Creation is faced with the threat of twelve new Harbingers, it will have to fight in kind...

► HARBINGERS: Your job is to use your powers to create messes for other people to clean up! CY-Ren gives no specific instructions outside of a general framework... flex your powers! See what you can do. Don't destroy the city or anything, but give Creation a run for its money. She needs these civilians alive for her later plans.

► STAR GUARDIANS: Twelve members of the carnival have been chosen by Creation to fight in its name, even if they don't realize it yet. When confronted by the Harbinger's chaos, their Sparks will make themselves known in whatever form is appropriate to the character - and they will be asked if they are willing to use the power of their soul to fight the darkness. How this scene plays out can be flexible, but essentially they will find themselves faced with the question: are they willing to fight for the preservation of life? If they say yes, their Spark will emerge, and they will be able to trigger a magical girl transformation, as you do.

► CHARITY CONCERT: While everyone else is busy with the sudden rise of the Harbingers, CY-Ren's PR team is releasing a statement -- they will say that new information has revealed that there had been bomb threats made against the canceled concert, which are now being blamed for the damages. CY-Ren will make a personal statement, saying that in order to apologize for the failure of her previous performances, a new free to attend event is being planned for the near future - people who had tickets to the previous event and had to go home early get top priority!

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"..Okay."

Promptly, he grabs the offending heel. Now, Vicarian is many things, but strong and overly capable in any form are not among those things, and pulling this way and that, he really isn't getting ANYWHERE except, unless 9s is careful, removing the shoe entirely. But he's giving it his best!

Small dragons, and apparently small human children, are not exactly strong. "...Or maybe not." He sits back on the ground, frowning. How else to get them off? Maybe he could burn it but that'd mean returning to his proper form.. "..Maybe if you walked on tippy toes, like a wolf?"

When Vicarian starts tugging at his boot, 9S suddenly remembers that it would be a really good idea to hang onto that lamppost so the pulling doesn't also pull him over back onto the ground.

His knees have already had a few first dates with the pavement, though his nanomachines had quickly taken care of the scrapes.

"You mean, put my weight on the balls of my feet?" Hm. Worth a shot. "What's a wolf, anyway?"

"..Isn't the ball of a foot the round part?" Heels. It made sense, they were more ball-like than the flat bit!

The question in turn is ... one he has trouble describing immediately, surprised instead that 9s doesn't already KNOW. "Um, they're .. four legged, furry, tailed carnivorous monsters about as tall as you are. Maybe bigger. They eat anything they can fit in their mouths, sometimes even uh, people."

Dragons. Small ones.

"...Why are you dressed like that anyway?"

"Round part?" 9S repeats slowly, confused. Thanks to having the lamppost as a stabliser, he awkwardly lifts his foot so he can tap the part in question. "I mean this spot."

As for why he's dressed like this...

He lowers his foot. "Uh, well... I received some new powers and it seems a clothing change was part of the deal?" He didn't ask for this! Just to be clear, "I don't normally dress like this, alright?"

"You know, the part you have a spike on right now." The heel. It's rounder! It should have that name! "But yeah I guess, if you're putting that part down before the spike maybe you can skip it entirely."

Children, perhaps, do not have the vocabulary and knowledge of anatomy that adults or even androids have. This matter of receiving powers and getting an outfit to go along with it earns 9S a long skeptical look. Powers, okay, but why would that change anyone's clothes?

He straightens back up. "How do you normally dress? Are your powers good powers or eeeevil powers?"

That's not the ball of the foot at all! But, now that he thinks about it, the heel is rounder. Why did humans decide the forefoot is called the ball of the foot, then? Hm. Maybe someone else knows the answer to this.

"Well... for starters, I wear boots." All the better for stomping on things. "And I usually dress in black. It's what I'm used to."

Sure, he could wear other colours, but it just doesn't feel really 'right' to him.

"Why would powers be defined as good or evil? It's all about what you use them for, and I definitely use them for good!"

He wouldn't use his powers to completely destroy their entire being just because they threw a taunt at him. Absolutely not. Totally.

Don't ask a kid, even a kid dragon. Why adults called anything ANYTHING ELSE eluded him, and the rest of the words he made up as he went along. He nods a little; boots definitely would be more practical.

And black was always nice! He wore a lot of it himself. His scales were even black! Well. 9s couldn't see that part.

"There's a lot of powers out there, that by their very .. um. ...Being there. What they are makes them good or bad, and they can change you! If a good person uses a bad power they begin doing bad things. But if they use good power, then they keep doing good things or do even MORE good things." 9S is eyed thoughtfully. He didn't SEEM malicious, especially with the skirt on. "Do you feel like suddenly destroying things?"

It's a very serious question from an 11 year old.

"Or maybe do you feel you need to protect people, or life, or a place? If you're ALWAYS doing good anyway it might be kinda hard to tell. But between you and me, the shoes makes me think someone had evil in mind."

9S squints suspiciously. Powers that change you into a good or bad person? Sounds fake. Nevertheless, 9S eyes his own hovering lasers as they rotate to the front of him, rather than staying at their position at his back.

9S takes Vicarian's question as seriously as if someone like Lambert or Rita had asked him it. Does he suddenly feel like destroying things? No, not really.

But there was always a small part of him that wishes that he could. Purge the injustice from this world, destroy the those who caused so much pain and suffering.

"What?" He glances down at his heeled shoes. "Oh, come on! There's no way these have anything to do with that? They're just inconvenient, that's all."

Except... if someone had good in mind... they'd choose something that isn't inconvenient, wouldn't they?? 9S' face wrinkles in consternation.

"If it was good powers," the 'human' points out with merciless glee, "Then you'd be wearing nice comfy shoes that are good to work in! Since they're not, someone clearly wants you to suffer."

That's not actually how it works, but as far as he's concerned it does, therefore that's what he's passing on. "But if you prefer good over evil, I hear there's a big market for people fighting against the nature of their powers!"

Well. Presuming 9S wants to be a minion.

He might not, in retrospect. "There's no reason to not resist after all, even if everyone says it's fun to give in. Do you want to be a hero instead of being evil like your feet say you should?"

Boots with heels are obviously a sign of evil. The skirt moreso. Bows and lace just cinched it really.

"My feet don't say anything!" 9S protests immediately.

But there's no arguing with the small human's logic; it was the same thing he was thinking, after all. And his feet, even if he doesn't suffer from quite the same problems of humans, still immensely protest the strange angle that they're being forced into.

"Of course I'm going to use them for good!" 9S salutes, left hand over his chest. "Why would I want to use them for evil? Besides, powers are just a tool... Just because you have the power to destroy doesn't mean it's inherently evil."

"But what if you want to destroy? Being evil doesn't always mean being bad, right?" Power isn't always a tool, but he already explained that and it doesn't occur to him to do it again. "Sometimes stuff needs to be broken. And besides, if nobody's ever evil, how will you know who the heros are?"

He straightens up, a little unsteady in his balance, which surely is just a moment of dizziness in passing and not still being unused to being on four legs even temporarily. "You can't tell just by looking at someone usually, unless they're making speeches, and then you can tell from the speech what sort they are."

This draws another look at the android. He hadn't heard a single speech yet. While it did seem likely that 9s did fall on the spectrum of heroic, he really should do more to demonstrate it.

This is an unexpectedly deep conversation he's having with this small human. 9S considers his words thoughtfully. Being evil not always meaning being bad sounds ridiculous to him. Aren't they the same? But the point about how without evil, no one will know who the heroes are...

"I guess you have a point. If you didn't know what evil is, then you wouldn't know what heroics are either. But... maybe it'd be nice to live in a world where you didn't need to know either of these things."

Maybe it would be boring. But fighting seems so... Well, maybe it isn't the fighting that's meaningless. The machines still need to be eradicated. Maybe it's just him that's meaningless.

But the thought's quickly derailed.

"Huh? A speech? How would you be able to tell from a speech?"

Every world had good and evil, and knowing what was what, and moer importantly what side a given person was on, was vital! This one so far fit his expectations to a tee.

"I don't know. Maybe it'd be nice. But maybe it wouldn't. Then all the awful things that happen are just out of pettiness or uncaringness or coincidence instead of some monster doing it on purpose, and maybe that'd be worse." Ooh, philosophy. Not Vicarian's realm of expertise, but he's game to give it a go. The idea of a world where things weren't ever black and white sounded.. disturbingly uncertain.

Uncertainties were scary.

Although he's pretty sure 9S is an adventurer at this point, he's also pretty sure he'll be fine if he doesn't explain he's a dragon, and sticks with the cute harmless little human thing. Even small dragons were targets, after all!

His incredulity however goes up a sudden notch. "You.. haven't you EVER faced someone, who just HAD to tell you all about why they're fighting you right now, before the fighting starts? Their whole plan, or how it's going to fix that or this, or destroy everything, or how they'll stop you and save someone, and all that? Or heard it happen to someone else?"

"Er..."

He was going to say 'no', but come to think about it... didn't Adam go on a big long monologue about the death of his alien creators and why he's turned his interest towards humans?

"Actually, now that you mention it... yeah."

Usually machines don't have the intelligence to even mimic anything like speech with thought behind it, but Adam was different... even if he was still just a machine.

"There was a machine who went on about how machines killed their creators and why he wanted me to bring him to my human creators. He was totally bonkers!" Totally. Bonkers. "But not everyone goes on about that sort of stuff. I mean, I haven't, right?"

That hesitation really tells Vicarian all he needs to know: it's a universal trait, and 9S has experienced it. The little 'human' nods sagely. This is completely what he expected.

"It's a little weird that a machine can give a speech, but you see? It happens everywhere." Machines, as far as he knows, are things like.. cars. And spaceships. How could they talk?

Well. Naaru could make anything probably, or a draenei. Presumably 9S had similar beings where he was from that could make simil-- human creators?

Human creators? 9S is given the eye again, this bit of information weighed very carefully. As far as he knew, 9S was some other form of humanoid, he just smelled a little unusual. "...Not everyone does, but the really worthwhile ones do," he says eventually, thoughtful. "If you're going to face a lot of people who make speeches, you're going to have to learn to make speeches back, it's just how it goes."

He really has no better explanation for it. It's just how things are done.

"...But you were made? You look normal! Well I mean aside from the evil shoes and the .. skirt." Even blindfolds weren't too strange.

Well, he wouldn't call his shoes evil, per se... no, scratch that. These shoes are totally evil! 9S gives a little grin of pride at passing for a human... though it's still a little weird to hear that from a human. And there's still a part of him that wonders if it's bad to be too much like a human in appearance. But, he supposes, he normally introduces himself as an android, so it's fine... right?

9S dips his head in a nod. "Yeah. I'm an android." He salutes, left hand over his chest. Some old habits are hard to shake. "I'm made of metal underneath this synthetic skin."

But more importantly...

"You sound like you've heard a lot of speeches. Could you teach me how to make one?" And not sound totally nutso in the process?

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⇨ INVASION!

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