⇨ POLARIS

[ringleaders]

Who: Everyone!
When: Days 102 - 109
Where: Polaris
What: With the Ringmaster kidnapped and the rest of the carnival imprisoned, characters find themselves at the mercy of a Winter Fae called the Mother of Invention.
Warnings: Graphic experimentation in places.

TRIALS & TRIBULATION↴ After a day of cleansing and processing, where all the belongings and attire of their old lives are stripped away and replaced with something newer and more form fitting, the former members of the carnival will find themselves let loose into the Farm for the first time. A sizable green area, filled with orchards growing inorganic looking fruits and field ready for tending, the Farm is where they will be spending their days for the forseeable future. Food and drink are no longer needed, and so every day is an endless cycle of work. Technicians are seen only when necessary, and when being taken from your place of work to your lonesome cells at night. Every day, there are new postings on the "Production Board", where various dire sound scientific trials ask for subjects. The majority won't be forced, at least not yet, but the system is at work to push its participants to the brink and force their hand. After all, volunteers make the best subjects. ► PRODUCTIVITY: As explained elsewhere, characters will be forced to compete to attain enough Productivity Point to be considered Satisfactory. There are literally not enough points to go around for everyone to attain this, which means that at least some people will be deemed "Below Expectations" by the end of the first four-day cycle. What this means has yet to be discovered, but the Technicians have grimly warned against it. Productivity involves many tasks, including orchard picking, tilling, planting, harvesting, watering, maintenance, and more. Any task you can think of that would take place on a plantation is applicable here. Beyond that, the Production Board awaits you, offering precious Productivity Points in exchange for your cooperation. How you become Satisfactory is up to you, but it's every person for themselves. Only one person can turn in the credit for harvesting or preparing fields, and while you can certainly try to help others by letting them take credit for your work, it's a sure fire way to fall behind the herd, especially if you are already in a low Classification. Fruits and fields will miraculously grow overnight, and will be ready for a new day when you are. You've been told not to eat anything you harvest, but right now you aren't hungry anyway. ► POLARIS BY NIGHT: During the night, you are left alone to your thoughts and maybe an annoying roommate. Solo or in pairs, the entire night will be spent in small sleep pods, as shown on the locations post. Is it possible to sneak out? It doesn't seem like it is, but who is to say? The real question is if you want to dare to try. There is one hour of rest before and after seven hours of darkness. Even if you don't usually have to sleep, you'll find yourself oddly weary and inclined to rest. Supernaturally, almost. ► PARTICIPATION: Sometimes participation in experimental trials is manditory, sometimes it isn't. You are free to handwave your character having been pulled aside for minor examinations, such as blood tests or aura scans. Each time, you will be pulled into a separate part of the station and analyzed by a Technician and heavily automated machinery. Anymore more complex than basic check-up level tests will be posted about in a section called "TRIALS" in the body of the post below.

Comments

[soft_focus]

...Yeah.

...but I don't want even worse things to happen to you. I still have to...

[She trails off, frowning toward the ladder a moment before looking up at Yuuya.

....

This is honestly the first she's actually looked at his face since she came in.] ....

....you have glowbug spots....

[hippocarnival]

[Yuya shakes his head more vehemently, not even remotely worried about himself. Lambert's already in trouble, he's worried. He can't switch so easily from his friend's health to his own.

Before he can explain that to Reira, though, she points out his face. He stops, bewildered.]

What? [Slowly he reaches for his face.]

[soft_focus]

[Here excuse her as she Physically Pokes your nose.] There's spots, like glowbugs.

...Or I guess stars.

[..........................]

...They're pretty.

[hippocarnival]

[Faint, fragmented memories from between panic attacks put themselves together. Places he was pricked, stung, stabbed. Oh.

He presses his hand more firmly to his face. Then the other.] It's... it's probably from the trial.

[They changed him, like everyone else. But he's not entirely sure how.]

[soft_focus]

[...Huh.] ....why would they want to make you glow?

[hippocarnival]

I don't know. I didn't--[He swallows, barely containing a shudder through his body.] I didn't... pay attention to all of it.

[A lot of it. Once the poison anchored him down it was hard to keep his mind focused on the specifics of what they were doing.]

[soft_focus]

[....] ....What was it supposed to be for? You're supposed to sign at the board right? [The trial, she means. Since THAT would have said something.]

[hippocarnival]

It was something to do with Creation, but it didn't say what they were going to do to me! [His voice catches on a higher, frightful note. At least, it didn't in words that were very clear that he was going to get modified, like Rita.

Well, he won't take that chance again.] Don't--don't take any of the trials, Reira. You're not having any trouble with the farm, right?

[soft_focus]

I already took one... [She mutters, holding her knees close to frown. Anyway she's not going to answer Those questions.]

...If it's 'Creation', then... ..maybe they put Creation in your face?

...And that's why it has a pretty glow now.

[IT'S AS MUCH SENSE AS ANYTHING?]

[hippocarnival]

[Maybe it's pretty, but Yuya just can't tie anything positive to that harrowing experience right now. Whatever Reira's talking about sounds distant and disconnected from him.]

Don't take more. [His voice is firm as he states that quickly.] please. They're hurting, they--they're taking people apart and changing them!

[That's why he's got spots now, isn't it?]

[soft_focus]

....would they do that to the people who get to be 'Delta'?

[Ah, well. She gets up from the bed, and starts climbing to the bunk above.] ...a few days ago, they made someone go for a 'mandatory' trial, [She notes.] ...It was the same person they called for something 'voluntary' before that. [She only really saw the numbers, but it seemed sort of telling.]

...I don't think everyone is going to get to choose, [she finishes, disappearing into the bunk space.] Not if they really want. They can break those rules too.

...if you work properly this time, I won't take one, [She adds distantly.] ...You have to promise that first.

[hippocarnival]

[Yuya's stares at her numbly. He doesn't want to hear this kind of bribery, even if it's out of worry. She doesn't get how severe things are.]

Reira. [His voice comes out raw.] This is serious. They took someone's heart out at one of those trials! They put something in me and I don't even know what it is! If they don't make you, just stay in the farm.

[soft_focus]

They took someone too, [She replies. She knows exactly how serious That is.]

So promise.

[hippocarnival]

I can't. [He can't promise it'll be enough. That something won't happen to him too. There's a creeping inevitability, because even just the thought of trying to do farm work is exhausting.] I don't know what's going to happen next week. I don't know how much worse they're going to make it!

[Is she even listening to him?] Why would you even want go through with one of those trials?!

[soft_focus]

It's not that I want a trial!

It's that I don't want you gone NEXT!

So promise to try! Promise to try to work anyway, like everyone else who got red, instead of just sitting and sleeping all day again!

[MISTER FAIL MEDITATION]

[hippocarnival]

I wasn't just sleeping! [Yuya's expression twists with indignation.] I wasn't trying to sleep all the time! I was doing something important so--so we can get out.

[Or at least, the start of getting out. At least he was able to give Rita a direction for continuing to reach Ignatius, because she was a lot more successful.

But he was also just combating the hunger, exhaustion, miserable sleep that kept him weary through the day, and he can't promise it's not going to get worse and prevent him from really working hard. Even if he doesn't need to meditate so much anymore, it's getting harder to keep up.]

[soft_focus]

Well we're still here, and you're in Eta, and you're probably going to disappear!

So I'm not going to agree to anything! [There's shuffling, and she buries herself in the blanket of the bunk.]

[hippocarnival]

[Yuya flinches like he's been slapped when his effort to something he thought was more important than that. If she doesn't have any reason to even do trials, than what? Is she just threatening him to make him agree?]

You should have left when Reiji did! [It comes out in a rush of frustration, but it's not entirely disingenuous. The carnival has become progressively a situation Yuya feels she doesn't belong in, and the most obvious chance to leave wasn't taken. And now they're stuck with this.

He just normally wouldn't say it that way.]

[soft_focus]

[Reira curls tighter and tighter in her blanket, but when Yuuya snaps, she finally does as well. She'd started all of this wanting to apologize, but now-]

...you're right.

...you are Zarc.

[...]

'm sleeping. You can see on your own, if I do a trial or not.

[hippocarnival]

[Yuya's increasing frustration at the childishness of this evaporates, quite suddenly, when she says not. It's not the statement itself, but all the implications with it, because being Zarc was never a good thing. His chest goes numb, and he's just left staring at the wall.

He throws the blanket over his head and squeezes his eyes shut. He needs to sleep, too. He needs to... to talk to that mysterious presence in his dreams. He has something he can tell them.]

[soft_focus]

[....She might have gone too far, with that. She opens her mouth to speak- to say something, anything, rolling over in the bed to look at the wall with the door.

But nothing comes out. Maybe a short gasping, breathy sound that's too faint for anyone but herself to hear, but that's all.

She wants to say something. Anything, would be better- Yuuya always said he was Zarc but that he had to make up for those actions somehow, that he was guilty of them, absolutely and utterly-

She was supposed to say that didn't matter.

...Instead she said it did.

He shouldn't have said that either, she quietly and bitterly thinks, not when it's the one thing she's wanted the choice in so badly, not when he finally said 'I'll stop asking you to leave', not when he, HE! Said he'd stay!

But maybe thinking all of that makes her Worse.

She rolls over again and waits until the room makes her feel tired, so that she can finally close her eyes. It doesn't matter.

He's just going to disappear anyway, because he can't even try.]

[hippocarnival]

[Yuya's rest isn't peaceful, but it's at least silent as he finally succumbs to the sleeping effects.

It doesn't last, though, because around midnight everything shakes, hard enough to force Yuya out of his dream as he jerks on the bunk, fingers absently digging into the mattress as he jerks his head up and looks around wildly, shocked and confused.]

[soft_focus]

[It shoves Reira about a bit herself-she almost falls off her bed with a yelp, in fact, dizzily sitting up and groaning.] MnnghHhhhh...

[...That's about when she realizes something. Something...faint.

Her eyes blink until they're open wide, and she slowly looks over the edge and down at Yuuya, on his own bunk.

...Is she picking up on....the feelings again?]

[hippocarnival]

What happened? [Yuya shifts back, staring at the door tensely like he's expecting something to come through it--good, bad, he doesn't know.

And then Reira peeks over, and he looks at her instead.]

[soft_focus]

[No one is coming. Reira certainly doesn't know that of course, but no one is coming, and her attention is on Yuuya anyway. Eyes wide, blinking once, twice...]

...Y...you...

...I can feel your feelings, again...

[Faintly. Quietly, like a soft whisper- but it's there.]