⇨ 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

[mirrortide]

"You look like you got run over by a truck." Lapis is the one who he happens to be next to at this particular moment in time, and she's got her head in her hand, looking utterly unconcerned about Lambert's current welfare.

[whattaprick]

"Thanks," Lambert rasps out, recognizing the voice but unable to even muster surprise at who's beside him right now. It makes as much sense as anything else, considering.

"You look like--" With an effort, he turns his head ... and grins dopily at her. It's probably an expression he's never used on her before, except for that memorable time he caught her with her hand up Peridot's shirt in Portland. "...like there are two of you."

[mirrortide]

"Nope. Still the only unfortunate Lapis Lazuli to end up here." She pauses for a moment, then holds up her hand and prods it, making what passes for her skin look like theres a ripple effect on it. "Unless you're talking about this. This is entirely new."

[whattaprick]

Don't require this much thinking of a man on drugs, Lapis. Lambert's face scrunches up as he squints, trying to focus. Someone has, incidentally, taken the time to carefully letter out IDIOT in bold letters on the side of his forehead that isn't bandaged (to be fair, there's a lot of real estate there). He obviously hasn't noticed, or isn't in a state to care.

"... You're bouncy?" he volunteers, haphazardly. And then-- "Let me try."

Yep, he's reaching out to try and give that arm a big ol' poke, if he can reach her. He's pretty slow, though.

[mirrortide]

He's slow, and Lapis is fast, and even aside from him being incapacitated, she's not about to let weirdos (sorry, Lambert,) start poking at her anyway. She swiftly moves out of the way, and points at him admonishingly.

"No touching. This is already weird enough, thanks. Nice tat, by the way." She's definitely referring to his head. Writing on skin is tattoos, right?

[whattaprick]

“But I wanna make you jiggle,” Lambert whines, though even the effort of lifting his arm is proving a bit much right now. He drops his hand back to the bed and just looks at Lapis tiredly. What tattoo? What is she even talking about?

“They got ... you back,” he says slowly, hazily. That’s a good thing, right? But why is Lapis here? “Where’s ‘Dot?”

[mirrortide]

"Technically I got us back, but sure. That works." There was crying and hugging and now that that's all over with, Lapis can reign her emotions back in! It's fantastic. "Peridot went to go take care of some stuff. With Steven, maybe?" She's not sure, but she is awfully bored here.

[whattaprick]

“Oh.” Lambert pauses to think about that, expression unfocused. Is he even going to remember this, the longest conversation he’s had with Lapis that wasn’t about crashing his couch or gem colony tactics?

“How’s Steven?”

[mirrortide]

"Unconscious. Not doing so great." But, you know, Alive. Which is probably the most important part of everything going on here. "How'd you end up here, anyway?" Because Lambert doesn't-

No, actually, he seems like exactly the sort to end up in the med tent. "Nevermind. What're you in for?"

[whattaprick]

Steven’s state at least goes some way to explaining why he’s here. No instant healing via bodily fluids.

“I pissed off the Ringmaster.” It’s said with calm, lazy candor. “I should be dead, but she didn’t let me.”

[mirrortide]

"Yikes. You must have really pissed her off then." And honestly Lapis is a little bit surprised at that. "What'd you do?"

[whattaprick]

“Said something stupid,” Lambert can’t even remember exactly what he said now — in the heat of the moment, he mouths off without putting a single thought about what’s coming out.

“We had the fae ... we didn’t leave him.”

[mirrortide]

"You... didn't leave him. What are you talking about?" Please fill her in, Lambert? Is there another fae pissed off at them? Because, like, Lapis can't handle that.

[whattaprick]

“We trapped him. We gave him our memories. Then I made her come ... and ...” He frowns. He doesn’t remember this part, on account of being incredibly unconscious. “Told ‘er to kill him or take him. Dunno which she did.”

[mirrortide]

Lapis hopes dead? Like, no offense to Iggy, she doesn't even know him, but she does know that she'd much rather him be dead and not a threat. Mostly because she doesn't understand that Fae are incredibly petty to begin with.

"Why'd you give him your memories?" That sounds like a bad plan, but this is the only thread of that that Lapis cares to follow.

[whattaprick]

“Mostly because... was tired of them fucking with ours.” It had seemed a good idea at the time. Weaken, shock him, and maybe ... something after that, if the Ringmaster hadn’t called.

“They don’t ... feel the way we do.” Can gems even feel the way humans do? Whatever, for the sake of the conversation that’s a technicality he’ll ignore. “So we tried to make him feel ... mortal.”

Whether it worked or not, he doesn’t know.

[mirrortide]

"Uhhuh. What I'm getting out of this is that you probably pissed him off that much more before whatever happened happened." And now Lapis is really hoping on death, but you know. "Don't know if you know this, but things that don't normally have to worry about death, generally are really bad at dealing with it."

See: Blue and Yellow Diamond, in response to Pink Diamond's death.

[whattaprick]

“I know,” Lambert says, tiredly. “The Ringmaster made the same mistake, when she killed the Winter Queen...”

Which, if Lapis didn’t know before thanks to fusing with Jasper? She knows now. Congrats, all our suffering is because someone made a bad call and their relatives deal badly with death! Sounds way too familiar huh!

“Fae can’t change ... but the Beast did.” He remembers what she was like in Portland. She’d admitted that wasn’t far from the truth. “Maybe we all can.”

[mirrortide]

"She did what." No wonder all this bad stuff keeps happening. That's what happens when you kill someone high up the food chain, and it takes an immense amount of restraint for Lapis to not start yelling and, quite frankly, flip Lamberts cot right the fuck over.

[whattaprick]

"Wasn't her fault." Whether Lambert realizes Lapis is suddenly in a killing mood or not is debatable, as he looks more or less on the verge of falling asleep again.

"The Winter Maiden used her." He's convinced himself of that story, more or less, even with nothing to support it but his own suspicions and his own spite.

[mirrortide]

"So she murdered her. Yeah, that seems totally fair." Are you Serious, Lambert? Like, Actually Serious? Of course it's her fault! MURDERING SOMEONE IS A CHOICE.

[whattaprick]

"Well," Lambert says, matter of fact. "She's not exactly smart, is she."

[mirrortide]

Lapis has to absolutely restrain herself from making a comment that would likely get into trouble, so. She's not even going to reply to that, but she does look like she very much agrees with that sentiment.

[whattaprick]

Lambert misses that look, and the pause gives his brain time to wander around, skipping around thoughts like a mayfly, before he settles on--

"Glad you're back."

[mirrortide]

"What?" Hopefully Lambert is understanding of the fact that Lapis doesn't understand why he'd be glad that she's back. In fact, she's giving him a very obvious I Don't Believe You look. "Why?"