⇨ THE EPILOGUE

[ringleaders]

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 61
Where: The Carnival
What: After all the rescues team return, it will be matter of tending to the wounded and getting the hell out of dodge. The Ringmaster can handle the fleeing part, but someone will need to look after those in the medical tent. Or, maybe, you just want to show up and ask what the hell happened.
Warnings: Some messed up consequences of faerie fuckery.

IN REPAIR↴ As the minutes tick past, all four rescue groups will eventually return. Everyone in the carnival is encouraged to help out, ensuring that the rescues and victims both are taken care of after the fact. You can tag in here as rescuers taking care of business around the carnival, victims recovering, or other workers checking in to see what's going on. This log is for general aftermath threads, made by anyone.

Comments

Hades - Medical Tent

[haides]

Out of habit, he hovers near the medical tent, sensing death on the air. It will be interesting to not be on the other end of it for once, however that doesn't stop him from expecting to hear some pleas. Death is frightening to so many, which undoubtedly alters his form in their eyes to something truly nightmarish.

But, really, he isn't that bad of a guy.

Moving through the shadows, he enters the tent, ducking his horned head. There is a small, knowing smile on his lips - as always. His expression is called disgusting for a reason - as it seems wholly wrong for the occasion. Yet it never wavers.

"Are you prepared for the crossing?" he pauses by the first bed, laying a clawed hand on the patient's forehead, "Magic shall stop your heart for only a little while. You will be called back."

Is that comforting? No? Well.

"By the look of it, you will not be alone." he raises his gaze to the other beds, musing over the various conditions, "The transformations are unique."

The Ringmaster has not disappointed him yet in that regard. He actually looks forward to how he will change.

[whattaprick]

"Fuck off. I'm not crossing anywhere."

The horned man Hades is resting his hand on right now doesn't exactly fear death, but he's accepted its eventual inevitability. That doesn't necessarily mean he's rushing towards it, though there have been more than a few close calls for the Carnival's sake. Lambert keeps his eyes shut, not currently on nearly enough painkillers to make the mistake of moving to swat the hand on his forehead off. A bandage covers a significant head wound, and others cover burns.

[haides]

"Are you sure?" Hades leans closer, looking...disappointed? Death is a passage he celebrates - for obvious reasons. His realm can always use another resident, though, for now, he will not be there to greet anyone.

"You don't look well." he takes a seat by the bed as if he has been invited to do so, "Was it worthwhile?"

The latter question is one he has posed more than a few times. Is life worthwhile? What of any unfinished business? Not that he is in the habit of granting wishes! He just wants the full story like any greedy death god.

[whattaprick]

"Not today." The Ringmaster willed it so, and so, Lambert isn't dead. Though he half-expected to be, and the thought crosses his mind this stranger might have been sent to finish the job... but that's not much her style at all, is it?

The question, though? Despite his own doubts, surely this guy doesn't expect him to answer in any other way but--

"It was." It has to be.

[haides]

No. She isn't so obvious with her actions - one of the many reasons Hades is drawn to her. And, now, Lambert. If she has chosen to keep him alive, he must wonder why and what she has in mind for both of them.

"Many say the same." he straightens and looks over the other beds, "Does it hurt to say otherwise?"

It must, he concludes. Every death must have a meaning - or so mortals tell themselves. He tends to think otherwise. Death just is - a foreseeable end that can be achieved in many, many ways!

[whattaprick]

"Life's too short to waste on crap like that," is all the answer Lambert has to offer to that. With an effort, he cracks his eyes open, peering up at Hades.

What he sees ... well, what he sees is a leshen, which might be monstrous for others but is really just another monster to kill for him. Lambert frowns, the haze of drugs making it hard to connect what he's seeing with reality.

"Never met one of you that could talk before," he volunteers, unevenly.

[haides]

"What am I?" Hades has played this game many times and he doesn't mind playing it once more, "I sense bravery in you, yet..." his voice lowers a notch, "Death does not please you; you do not seek it. It is life that you cling to and that is just as well."

For he does not like seeing spirits entering his domain prematurely. Life should be celebrated to the last millisecond. Then and only then will his new companion be certain that they have plenty of stories to tell their curious lord.

[whattaprick]

"A leshen," Lambert answers. The thought that Hades may or may not even know what the hell a leshen even is doesn't even cross his mind right now, and he's already trying to gesticulate, weakly.

"A kind of monster ... forest spirit. Controls beasts and plants, that sort of thing. Pain in the ass to fight, too."

cw: virulent jealous sexism?

[scientificist]

As he's fairly distracted by trying to create something for Steven's crystalisation issue, it takes Herbert a moment to notice the new arrival...and then immediately sneer at her. Megan? To him, Hades seems to be a petite blonde woman, Dan's fiancee.

He's inclined to ask her what the hell she thinks she's doing here--but then it occurs to him. Of course, she was at the school for her nursing degree (or her MRS, as it happened, no sense of drive), so she must be a new member of his team. Just his luck--the useless half of that couple. He couldn't be so lucky as to have them both arrive, could he? Probably not. He walks over to her once she's done talking to the patients.

"Miss Halsey," he says, determined to actually seem like a Supervisor, "is chatting with patients really the best use of your time?" It comes off as really only barely polite, and tips over into rude with his dismissive expression.

[haides]

What has happened to love? Hades may indeed look like a certain fiancee, but Herbert will find that her smile is a little...disturbing. She isn't swayed by his reaction or what he says. Herbert is speaking to an ancient god who is not known to ever grow upset or angry.

"I do not want to miss any of their deaths." he cocks his head, curious as to why Miss Halsey is treated with such disrespect. The genders have often come into conflict - many have died for that reason - but he has always been more intrigued about why men and women feel so...estranged.

"Do you think any will perish of their wounds?"

To him, that is a perfectly logical and normal question; not at all inappropriate.

[scientificist]

Hades does nothing to dissuade Herbert from who he believes him to be so...Herbert is initially somewhat taken aback. This feels...wrong, odd.

But then, abruptly, he catches on. Of course, Megan knows about the experiments he and Dan were performing. This is her subtle way of warning him: she's watching him. An insult, frankly, he'd never let his science bleed into his duties as the Carnival's Doctor.

"Absolutely not," he says coldly, quietly, face tight with barely repressed fury. "What do you take me for, Megan? Iiii know what you think. Madman. Butcher. Yoooou won't find your proof here, I am a model. Physician. And!" He raises a hand, indicatively, curled just in front of his chest below his chin. "I've been here longer than you--who do you think they'll believe? I'm a Supervisor. And you're a little fool, grasping at petty straws in an attempt to destroy what you are too dense, too small-minded to understand."

This would be a really great speech, maybe, if he was talking to someone anywhere near his intended target.

I swear I will get this right somehow.

[haides]

His attention is less than stellar. The cold tone has little effect on him and he lets the man talk himself into silence. His gaze, which had been anywhere but on Herbert's face during the speech, returns to the man. One brow rises and he smiles, very slowly.

"Are you purged of that poison?"

Who knew better than he that emotions could be deadly? So many had joined him, rotting until they mixed with the dirt for that reason. Oh the stories varied, but the result is constant.

"Trust not your eyes, Physician. She you see is but a mask; a memory. My name is Hades." and, Herbert, you need to breathe.

Or don't. Then Hades will be well-pleased that someone in this tent will drop dead.

It's all good!

[scientificist]

Herbert just. Stares blankly. Opens his mouth briefly and then closes it again, looking beyond confused. He'd be inclined to say Meg's lost her mind but...he's seen magic. He knows it's a field, now. Still, this is incredibly bewildering, if he decides to go along with it. She isn't talking like Megan, at least, if that's proof. He struggles internally for a moment longer before speaking.

"The...Greek god, of the Underworld? ...whyyyy are you wearing Megan Halsey's face?"

[haides]

"The god of the Earth and all that lies beneath." he corrects, smirking as if he finds the inquiry highly amusing, "Should you not be asking yourself that question? It is you that has chosen this form for me."

Mind over matter, Herbert. A cave can be a place of danger for one and a blessed shelter for another. Megan Halsey must be connected with some rather strong feelings in the doctor or else she would not be the first he recalls when facing his "doom". (Though, really, is anyone noticing that Hades isn't physically harming anyone?)

[scientificist]

It's actually even worse to see Megan looking so smug. Usually she's just complaining about scientific progress or trying to make Dan as small-minded as she is. Her smirking at him like this like he's the idiot is nearly unbearable.

"I didn't choose anything," he asserts, glaring. Isn't Hades supposed to be male? Why would he want to replace anyone's appearance with his roommate's fiancee?