lostcarnival | ⇨ POLARIS AFTERMATH

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⇨ POLARIS AFTERMATH

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 115-118
Where: Polaris/Wyldlands
What: After killing the Mother of Invention, the majority of the carnival has decided to take some time and sort out the Polaris refugees before heading to the Summerlands. This log covers miscellaneous post-Mother Polaris drama, as well as some light camping in the Wyldlands down below.
Warnings: Idk, stuff, I guess.

ADAPTATION↴

After the battle, the majority of carnival members will opt to remain in the secured section to Polaris, hoping to spend some time making sure that the rest of Polaris is liberated. Many of the staff are not capable of coming to grips with the fact that the Mother is dead so quickly, and the remaining Alphas are doing their best to keep Polaris under their sway. It will be a busy few days of changing minds and exploring the remains of the station. Thankfully, with everyone's powers intact and allies at their side, they finally have the advantage.

► SHIFTING STATES: Right off the bat, about 10% of the staff will immediately change sides upon hearing whats become of the Mother. They are actively eager to get away from Polaris, and will do whatever they can assist the carnival. This is mostly Gammas and a few Betas, who were working primarily under duress. Over the next day or two, those numbers will grow to at least 30%, with some of the staff managing to convince their colleagues to join them. About two days after starting, one of the Alphas will surrender to the carnival, encouraging those beneath her to support their cause. That leaves four Alphas remaining, and staff cooperation at 50%.

► CAPTIVE ATTENTION: The loyalist staff's main tactics are trying to create defensive points within the various test group areas, using the prisoners as hostages. Luckily, the carnival (and the staff on their side) will be in a position where it's possible to push them out with a mixture of convincing and force. Once prisoners start being freed, there will be even more force backing the carnival's efforts, meaning that it will essentially become a matter of cleaning up the remaining staff rather than any uphill battles. Most of this is being left vague intentionally, as most of this action is being handwaved. However, you can play out parts of it if you want and NPC technicians and rescuees. Other test groups can be filled with basically whatever kind of residents you like, since they are grabbed from across the multiverse. Most of the test areas are similar to B7.

► THE JACKPOT: Alongside cleaning up the staff, some members of the carnival have expressed interest in convincing the staff to help them with armoury issues as well as hunting down some of the Mother's most private loot. This will be handled in investigations, mostly through summary, because I don't have it in me for another megathread right now. Post your plans, and I will respond! However, know that I also don't have time to generate five million special items, so loot drops will be limited to my availability. Also, the techs aren't really blacksmiths so they generally won't really be able creating weapons from scratch or anything.

Meanwhile, Ignatius is going to set up a camp ground outside of Polaris, mostly because he doesn't want to be there anymore. He'll keep a fire going and they can drag things from Polaris down there for camping purposes, and mostly Ignatius is just going to be chilling and making sure that the campground doesn't get assaulted by magical creatures. The Gilded Mark will create a portal between the campground and the station so that people can go back and forth as required. It also creates a handy escape route.

You can even see Polaris from here, floating up there in the sky. How picturesque.

► WYLDERKIN: Apparently not everything in the Wyld Lands is a full Wyld Fae - there are also a lot of less powerful creatures called 'wylderkin' - apparently lesser forms of the Wyld Fae, who are more akin to animal level intelligence. They can be a variety of expected fantasy type creatures, such as flower sprites, weird bugs, and general prey animals they probably spend most of their time getting eaten by bigger dudes. All of them are sort of weird and fantastical, and none of them are exactly like earth varieties, though they may resemble them. They are more of a pest than a major threat in this part of the Wyld Lands, and Ignatius will scare away any that cause too many problems.

► FLORA AND FLUID: There are some plants that you can eat down here, that Ignatius will tell you about. Mostly weird berries and roots. There is also some pools of clear water, thought hey are filled with weird fish. Try not to bitten by any weird leeches. You can safely make up some of the creatures you find as long as they fit the general theme of lesser faerie creatures. This is just a rest stop.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Uhhh."

Right. Beau almost forgot, in her enthusiasm about fire energy, that Strange has a bit of a reputation for getting into shit over his head. At least he asked before they tried anything.

"Not... really? I mean, it helps me dodge things that would make me feel pain, but once the pain hits I'm kind of out of luck." She shrugs. "But I'm a big girl, I've gotten burned before."

"There's burning and then there's setting your hands on fire," Strange teases. "But that should be an easy enough fix. I can tweak the spell's framework a little so that the fire doesn't destroy your hands."

Gotta have your hands to punch something. "Of course, if you want, I could set your hands on fire right now, before we start our lessons, and we could judge the level of pain that way."

Yes Beau, lessons. You wanna learn how to fire punch, you've got to sit through a bit of magical theory.

Ughh, theory. At least this isn't paragraphs and pages of theoretical maundering. Yet. So far it's some bare basic outline of dangers, and the promise of imminent hands-on destructive fun to hold her attention well enough.

"Okay, uhh..." She flexes a hand in front of her, shifting back and forth as she considers the likelihood of way too many blisters in her future, and no particular healing magic to be had. "Do you need to burn me before you tweak it? Because like, I can, totally, take it, but that doesn't mean I want to. But just do it if you have to."

"I think I've figured out the spell to make it so you don't burn yourself? But the problem is, I'm relatively fireproof and fire magic isn't my forte." He can make things burn real good and that's about it. Strange doesn't have a focus or in-depth knowledge into fire magic like some other people do. He essentially uses it as a glorified flamethrower: make it big, make it fast, make it dangerous.

"I would like to try the spell out on your hands before I teach it to you, just so that I don't accidentally teach you something that cripples you when you use it."

"Your hair is on fire, and you're not great at...?" Beau starts to wonder, skeptical and squinting at the ever-burning tips on his head. "Whatever, I hate this anticipation, let's just do this."

Before she loses her nerve, because it's one thing to jump into fight club and another thing to volunteer to stand here while someone lights her hands on fire, but hell if she's admitting that.

Strange grins. Hell yeah, let's do this! He is always up for rushing through things without thinking of the consequences and this looks like the perfect time to do so.

He places his hands out in front of him as he mutters something under his breath. A moment later, Beau's fists magically light themselves on fire. Strange thinks he's gotten the spell figured out to keep her hands from being burned. But honestly, he's like 2/3 certain he's got the spell figured out to keep her hands from being burned.

Beau's eyes light up with the fire, though it's part enthusiasm and part reflected light from the flame on her hands. In her hands, a little bit. She squints at the flame as it keeps going, tentatively flexes a hand, watching how the fire flexes around with her.

"Okay, okayokayokay, that's pretty hot, uh..." She starts leaning back as if to distance herself from her own hands, stiffening to keep herself from looking like she wants to bolt for some water. "Yeahhhh, that's still a little hot for comfort."

Oh, shit, okay that's hotter than he expected. "Stay still, I'll dispel the flames," Strange quickly says.

It takes him a few seconds to mutter the incantation, but the flames leap from Beau's hands to a fireball floating above one of Strange's. With a gesture from the non-fireball hand, the flames vanish.

"Obviously the spell needs a little work," he will admit. "Still, you did have your hands on fire and you probably could have punched something if you wanted to."

"Yeah, we win on all the technicalities," Beau grouses as she wrings her hands to check their condition. Nothing's catastrophic or particularly obvious visually, but there's that too-tight feeling, and the lingering sense of heat that promises some blistering to come.

"Mn. Shit. I mean, you're on to something, that did not hurt like fire should." She starts undoing her wrist wrappings, patting them down for sparks in case Strange's mumbling didn't pull them all away. "But you're... are you totally fireproof, or what, because you've got a little bit... your hair?"

"What? Oh, no, the hair happened a while ago. I think I'm fireproof because the Mother of Invention muddled with my magical composition." Strange doesn't know what the hell genetics are and doesn't really have any way to explain this aside from him bullshitting terms and hoping they sound sensible.

"I think the fireproof nature is because I can do this now." And then, without waiting for Beau to say anything, Strange poofs into a small, fireball form. The form's about a foot wide and is hovering above the ground.

The barebones explanation is probably best, anyway. Everybody knows that when a human and an elf get together sometimes they make a half elf, but that doesn't mean she's ever seen a Punnett square, or anything more detailed.

But this is the first time she's seen a person turn into a fireball.

"What the fuck," Beau jolts back, fists up at the ready even with the twinges in them. "Strange?"

The fireball zips around a little bit, making a circle around Beau, before Strange reforms into his human shape. Aside from his normally burning hair, there's no trace that he was just recently a literal fireball.

"A gift from the Mother of Invention," Strange explains. "Though honestly, I'm not too bothered by it. I had almost worked out something like this myself before she changed me."

Beau follows its flight, and continues boggling at Strange even once he's back to normal. "That wasn't, like, an illusion or something? You just literally fire?"

She has to ask, because illusions are an easier explanation, one that better fits the context of her own life experiences. But given how Strange is preening about it, she gets the feeling it was exactly as it seemed.

"And you can fly around, and see even though you didn't have eyes or anything..." She shakes her head slowly, a bit envious and baffled by the things magic lets happen. "What happens to food you ate, when you don't have a stomach...?"

Strange nods! Yep, not an illusion. It's literally fire.

"I can speak also," he clarifies, with a little shrug. "Don't ask how that can happen. I think it's because I have elemental forms instead of animal forms. The members who can turn into animals are limited by the vocal chords they have, where as my elemental forms are held together by pure magic, it's all a little more flexible."

The food question, however, gives him a little pause. Just because it is literally something he's never thought about before and also what kind of question is that. "I assume it gets changed along with me? I can turn my clothes into fire or smoke as well, any food inside me probably gets changed like they do."

"What the fuck," Beau repeats, shaking her head. "Magic is bullshit. Who needs to know how anything works? Just wave your hands and say some words, maybe rub a gem or smear some sticky shit around, and bam, things happen."

It's increasingly clear that Strange's mix of uncertainty and confidence, shown when he outlined what he knew back in that underground pool, is just the standard operating procedure. The whole carnival is just flying around by the seat of their pants.

On the one hand, anyway. On the other hand, obviously magicians have to do experiments to get things to work how they want. And if she wants to make this thing happen, she's going to need to face the fire a few more times.

"Alright. So do you think you can you do, like, one of my elbows?" She shrugs a little, showing how not-yet-burnt they are. "Or does it have to be my hands?"

"I know how English magic works," Strange defensively points out. "I wrote an entire book on it. But shifting forms like this is faerie magic and, admittedly, I don't have that pieced out as much as I would like."

He knows how his magic works! Just not other magic. "And of course I can set one of your elbows on fire," Strange grumbles, as he looks over at Beau. "Though again, I'm tinkering with the spell's framework. I'm not sure how burnt or not burnt your elbows might be."

"Yeah yeah yeah, I get that, don't get all huffy at me." Beau rolls her eyes, losing her grip on the part where she's supposed to emphasize how curious and grateful she is in exchange for the favor. "Shit's weird, you're figuring it out, expect some mistakes. I'm not saying you suck at this."

She flexes a hand again, testing the tightness, and yeah, she's going to need something cool for that soon. "I just mean, while you're figuring it out, how about we spread the burning out a little? Little burn here, little burn there, so it doesn't add up in any one spot."

Unsurprisingly, Strange is looking a little apprehensive at setting more of Beau on fire. Sure, just the hands were okay. But now her elbows? He doesn't want to completely burn her, come on Beau! Still, he does want to piece out and teach her this spell, and he's not going to do so unless he gets in more practice.

"Alright," Strange says, with a little nod. "Which elbow do you want to be burned first?"

"Mmm... Let's go with my right." With clothes being a little bit at a premium, as their more mundane belongings went missing (got destroyed), Beau's in one of the technician outfits. It's thankfully sleeveless, with a billowy mini-coat effect, and not the worst thing she's ever worn. It's easy enough to finish pulling the wrappings off and make her elbow a nice easy target.

But, just in case, she has to ask: "You know I'm kidding about the burning, right? Tone the spell down a little this time."

"I know you're kidding," Strange grumbles in return, as he places his hands in front of him. "But there's no delicate way to ask 'which part of you am I going to set on fire.'"

And then, Strange pretty much sets Beau's elbow on fire. There's a lot less fire than there was on her hand, but the flame is noticeably weaker. It almost feels like the fire's hovering juuuuust above the elbow, though Strange's concentration wavers and occasionally the fire dips down to brush against Beau's skin.

All the while, he's muttering under his breath and creepily staring at her elbow.

Is there a good time to walk in on Strange setting someone on fire? Probably not. All Shura wanted to do was take a walk, maybe take out some of her frustration on some poor fruit tree or whatever was left after their revolt, but nooo. She has to walk in on Strange attempting to set her once-trailermate on fire.

Since suddenly calling out or interrupting seems like a bad idea right at this second, Shura won't do anything obvious to make her presence known. Instead, she'll just casually come to a stop ten feet away from them, standing with a hand on her hip and and exasperated expression on her face. Come on, Beau, this better be for something good.

Whether it's for anything good is an entirely subjective question, honestly. They're spending time on this that could be spent gathering resources or info, to experiment with teaching Beau - not a mage - how to punch magic fire. It's something one of the fae could offer instead, and maybe more easily if she swears to them. Ultimately, it's mostly for fun, and having something where they feel, if not quite competent, in control.

Beau's the first to notice Shura's arrival, since she's not busy staring and muttering at elbows, and she greets the other woman with a bit of a flex. The fire flickers harder into her elbow as she moves, and she winces a tiny bit.

"What do you think," she asks with a slightly forced smile as her eye twitches. "Do I look hot with this fire on me?"

"If that's Lambert or Childermass, tell them to piss off," Strange bluntly responds, as he still focuses on Beau's elbow. The spell gets a little easier the more he fiddles with it and continues to cast it...but that doesn't change the fact that it was damn hard to begin with. All his concentration is focused on Beau's elbow and keeping the spell together, to the point where he's not even looking at the new arrival.

But he hopes it isn't Lambert or Childermass. The last thing he wants right now is a lecture, of all things.

The longer the fire floats around Beau's elbow, the less frequently it touches her arm. Strange is slowly getting the hang of this.

"You expectin' a lecture or somethin'?" Why else would he be afraid of those two in particular? But since Beau seems to be okay with the entire elbow on fire thing, Shura can't really say much. Two consenting adults could do whatever weird stuff they wanted.

Since it's better to talk to Beau, Shura will happily disregard any of Strange's potential complaints for the moment as she steps closer. "Hot? Nyehe, smokin' hot is more like it. Can't say I've ever heard of this kind of spa treatment, though."

With Shura speaking up, there's no need to reassure Strange that it's not one of the supervisors come to scold them for wasting time injuring people in experiments. But that's the kind of thought that leads to letting her guard down, and she glances around their surroundings, just to doublecheck that neither of them's coming by before she gets too confident. When the coast looks clear, she reverts to posing for Shura.

"It's, uh, the latest thing. Burn your dried skin away, you know." She bites at her lip, because the fire itself isn't tickling her skin as much as it had with her hands, but the heated air so close for so long is still having some impact. "Little bit sweltering... Hey, do you think it'd work on my feet? Fire kicks would be pretty hard core."

And with boots on, she might get a little extra insulation against the burns.

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up to you whether the spell works or beau gets to go to the hospital~

she doesn't have the points for it yet, so: mild burning, he did mitigate the worst of it

get some aloe vera, beau

time to go to the planet and stick her hands in some weird alien plants

a+ planning

at least if she gets a rash it should be interesting colors

enjoy your plant rash, it is literally blooming

join the carnival, they said. it'll really help you blossom, they said. no one mentioned the bees

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