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🤡🤡🤡
âś– THE CARNIVAL
â… . ARRIVAL & THE TEMPLE
You can read all about your character's arrival in the game lore.
You can see the lights of the Ferris wheel from the water, and by the time you pull into port you can smell popcorn, cotton candy, grease, sawdust. Music drifts on the air, interspersed with screams from the rides.
The carnival is in town.
Not just any carnival, either - the carnival. The one to end all others. Every circus you ever read about or saw in a movie, with striped tents filled with acrobats and sideshows, midway games complete with carnival barkers in straw boater hats. But it's also every shitty fair that ever rolled through your hometown, with unreliable looking men with greasy mullets smoking as they jockey the Wild Mouse, the Gravitron, the Zipper, the Corkscrew. There's a constant stream of 80s hair metal playing underneath the roar of the rollercoaster tracks, blending somehow with the traditional piping organ of the carousel.
Experienced Travelers will know by now that every island has its own temple, and this one is no exception. It’s not in the carnival proper, though; if you step away from the lights of the midway and tents, you’ll notice dozens of old wooden circus trailers, arranged in a circle, growing tighter together the closer to the center you walk. The trailers are functional living places, with built in beds - sometimes one, sometimes two - and a small table and an old wood burning stove with a cooking top just big enough to boil a kettle on. There’s a toilet, but if you want a shower you’ll have to go outside and find a tent set up at the outskirts of the makeshift trailer park where there are tent showers set up, locker room style.
The clearing in the middle of the parked caravan is completely empty except for a solitary midway game: a towering high striker. It must be at least twenty feet tall, surmounted by a round, red bell. A wooden mallet is leaned against a sign next to the game that reads, predictably, TEST YOUR STRENGTH.
Step right up.
â…ˇ. HALL OF MIRRORS
When it comes to amusements, the Hall of Mirrors has always been second-fiddle to the Haunted House. But the line for the former was shorter, so here you are. The guy working the door has weasel eyes and is smoking. He gestures for you and whoever is behind you to enter together; "No singles. For safety."
The lights are a dull neon, cycling from deep blue to cyan to purple and back again. You find that your outstretched fingers will bump against smooth, clear glass as often as not. The mirrors reflect the maze back into itself over and over, disorienting and strange.
Some of the mirrors are convex, some concave, and as you pass them your reflection warps and bends alongside that of whoever you're stuck inside the maze with.
At some point you will realise that the reflection looking back at you isn't quite right. It's still you, sure, but it's not how you really look, not on the outside.
Looking back at you from the cold glass is how you perceive yourself. Perhaps that's stronger, perhaps uglier, perhaps as a sniveling child or an ancient hag. And this reflection is going to follow you from mirror to mirror as you desperately try to find your way out.
One of you spots an exit sign, bleeding red light. Only catch is that it's behind a pane of glass. And another. And another. You could break your way through all of them, certainly, but it's not as if there's anything laying around for you to use to do so. Just yourself, which might work in action movies but tends to cause a lot of physical damage in the real world.
Above the glass someone has placed a sticker that reads, “who are you really?” in black sharpie. Answer it, and the glass will swing open. Don't, and well...
Guess you'll have several years worth of bad luck.
â…˘. THE CAROUSEL
CW: childhood trauma
Old fashioned organ music and a million flashing lights draws you to the carousel. It's a vintage delight: huge, with ornate animals carved out of wood and lovingly hand painted. There are horses, of course, but also lions and leopards and birds and rabbits and wolves... any animal you could want! In fact, you'll see an animal that looks perfectly YOU. You just have to climb up on it for a ride.
When it stops and you step off, you will be younger. You will in fact be the same age you were when a formative event happened to you.
You're a kid at a carnival! How fun! Well, maybe you're not that young, and it's probably not very fun at all considering that now your trauma is fresh.
The only way to become your proper age again is to get on the carousel and get it to run forward. Depending on your age, you might not be able to figure any of that out, but surely one of the other Travelers can help you. You'll definitely need someone to man the carousel controls. Oh, and be careful not to knock it into overdrive...
â…Ł. COULROPHOBIA
CW: clowns, suffocation
Who can possibly resist the big top? Not you! You're ushered into the tent and you take a seat in the stands, where you have an excellent view of the huge ring before you. The excitement in the air is palpable, and even if you're the grouchy type you'll find yourself a little bit thrilled.
It's a little surprising when the lights go up to the sound of screaming guitars. Mist belches from hidden foggers, and flames shoot from near the center of the ring. The lights stutter red, blue, green. The whole thing is a lot more rock show than it is Ringling Brother's.
At any rate, even if the ringmaster looks like a reject from a trailer park metal band and the music is liable to burst some eardrums, it's still a circus. There are trained horses and riders, contortionists, and a score of talented trapeze artists. It's all sparkling and impressive and terrific fun.
The trapeze artists take their bows, clearly ready for a break. And if a break is needed at the circus? You know what happens next, don't you?
SEND IN THE CLOWNS!
The clowns spill into the ring, all sorts of them! There's Harlequin and Pierrot, Auguste and Tramp. There's Bozos and Ronalds and Clarabelles and Krustys. Hopefully no Gacys, but there's so many of them that it's hard to know for sure.
One of these clowns - the one you hate the most, of course - approaches you in the stands. With comically exaggerated movements, it leans close to you and whispers...
Well. It whispers horrible things to you, really. It recounts to you some instance in your life where you delighted in the suffering of another, a moment where you really and truly were happy that somebody else was hurt. It's not a moment to be proud of, for sure, but as the clown tells your own secret shameful joy to you, you start to laugh. Really laugh - soon you're bent over double, tears running down your face, absolutely howling with laughter.
Your stomach hurts, and you're running out of breath. Very soon you won't be able to breathe at all.
Eventually, one of your fellow travelers won't be able to resist asking you, "What's so funny?"
The only way to stop laughing is to tell them. Otherwise you're going to pass out right where you sit, a creepy clown leering over you the whole time. Maybe your fellow traveler will be nice enough to drag you out of there if that happens, because if you're left alone? Everybody knows clowns get so much scarier alone in the dark.
It wouldn't be a party without some jams.
You can read all about your character's arrival in the game lore.
You can see the lights of the Ferris wheel from the water, and by the time you pull into port you can smell popcorn, cotton candy, grease, sawdust. Music drifts on the air, interspersed with screams from the rides.
The carnival is in town.
Not just any carnival, either - the carnival. The one to end all others. Every circus you ever read about or saw in a movie, with striped tents filled with acrobats and sideshows, midway games complete with carnival barkers in straw boater hats. But it's also every shitty fair that ever rolled through your hometown, with unreliable looking men with greasy mullets smoking as they jockey the Wild Mouse, the Gravitron, the Zipper, the Corkscrew. There's a constant stream of 80s hair metal playing underneath the roar of the rollercoaster tracks, blending somehow with the traditional piping organ of the carousel.Experienced Travelers will know by now that every island has its own temple, and this one is no exception. It’s not in the carnival proper, though; if you step away from the lights of the midway and tents, you’ll notice dozens of old wooden circus trailers, arranged in a circle, growing tighter together the closer to the center you walk. The trailers are functional living places, with built in beds - sometimes one, sometimes two - and a small table and an old wood burning stove with a cooking top just big enough to boil a kettle on. There’s a toilet, but if you want a shower you’ll have to go outside and find a tent set up at the outskirts of the makeshift trailer park where there are tent showers set up, locker room style.
The clearing in the middle of the parked caravan is completely empty except for a solitary midway game: a towering high striker. It must be at least twenty feet tall, surmounted by a round, red bell. A wooden mallet is leaned against a sign next to the game that reads, predictably, TEST YOUR STRENGTH.
Step right up.
Notes:
1. Please remember to mark threads appropriately with Content Warnings when necessary.
2. These prompts are a jumping off point - how they affect your character and their development is up to you.
3. The island temple is accessible to all. The High Temple is only accessible to new characters this month - it will re-open to all others next month.
4. The Test your Strength game can be played by anyone. How well your character does is entirely up to you, but the game does not necessarily measure physical strength.
5. These residents of the island are normal humans. Killing them is possible and will affect the colour grading of your Scrywatch depending on the situation.
6. Any food found on the midway is safe to eat, and is consumable by non-human entities.
7. Have fun!
â…ˇ. HALL OF MIRRORS
When it comes to amusements, the Hall of Mirrors has always been second-fiddle to the Haunted House. But the line for the former was shorter, so here you are. The guy working the door has weasel eyes and is smoking. He gestures for you and whoever is behind you to enter together; "No singles. For safety."
The lights are a dull neon, cycling from deep blue to cyan to purple and back again. You find that your outstretched fingers will bump against smooth, clear glass as often as not. The mirrors reflect the maze back into itself over and over, disorienting and strange.
Some of the mirrors are convex, some concave, and as you pass them your reflection warps and bends alongside that of whoever you're stuck inside the maze with.At some point you will realise that the reflection looking back at you isn't quite right. It's still you, sure, but it's not how you really look, not on the outside.
Looking back at you from the cold glass is how you perceive yourself. Perhaps that's stronger, perhaps uglier, perhaps as a sniveling child or an ancient hag. And this reflection is going to follow you from mirror to mirror as you desperately try to find your way out.
One of you spots an exit sign, bleeding red light. Only catch is that it's behind a pane of glass. And another. And another. You could break your way through all of them, certainly, but it's not as if there's anything laying around for you to use to do so. Just yourself, which might work in action movies but tends to cause a lot of physical damage in the real world.
Above the glass someone has placed a sticker that reads, “who are you really?” in black sharpie. Answer it, and the glass will swing open. Don't, and well...
Guess you'll have several years worth of bad luck.
Notes:
1. Yes, characters can bash their way out of the maze, but it is real glass and will cut anyone who isn’t invulnerable. There is a first aid station run by extremely unreliable carneys on the premises, so hopefully they can patch themselves up enough there.
â…˘. THE CAROUSEL
CW: childhood trauma
Old fashioned organ music and a million flashing lights draws you to the carousel. It's a vintage delight: huge, with ornate animals carved out of wood and lovingly hand painted. There are horses, of course, but also lions and leopards and birds and rabbits and wolves... any animal you could want! In fact, you'll see an animal that looks perfectly YOU. You just have to climb up on it for a ride.
When it stops and you step off, you will be younger. You will in fact be the same age you were when a formative event happened to you.
You're a kid at a carnival! How fun! Well, maybe you're not that young, and it's probably not very fun at all considering that now your trauma is fresh.
The only way to become your proper age again is to get on the carousel and get it to run forward. Depending on your age, you might not be able to figure any of that out, but surely one of the other Travelers can help you. You'll definitely need someone to man the carousel controls. Oh, and be careful not to knock it into overdrive...
Notes:
1. If your character does not get back on the carousel and ride it in reverse, they will revert to their actual ages at the end of the month.
2. Please be especially mindful of content warnings with underage characters. A reminder that the game does not allow explicit sexual content with minors.
3. You do not have to regress your character to childhood - if a very formative event happened at age 20 for example, you can choose that route instead.
4. Speeding up the carousel while it is moving forward will result in, you guessed it, aging your character UP. Obviously you can ride it backwards again to fix this, or again the aging will be reversed at the end of the month.
â…Ł. COULROPHOBIA
CW: clowns, suffocation
Who can possibly resist the big top? Not you! You're ushered into the tent and you take a seat in the stands, where you have an excellent view of the huge ring before you. The excitement in the air is palpable, and even if you're the grouchy type you'll find yourself a little bit thrilled.
It's a little surprising when the lights go up to the sound of screaming guitars. Mist belches from hidden foggers, and flames shoot from near the center of the ring. The lights stutter red, blue, green. The whole thing is a lot more rock show than it is Ringling Brother's.
At any rate, even if the ringmaster looks like a reject from a trailer park metal band and the music is liable to burst some eardrums, it's still a circus. There are trained horses and riders, contortionists, and a score of talented trapeze artists. It's all sparkling and impressive and terrific fun.
The trapeze artists take their bows, clearly ready for a break. And if a break is needed at the circus? You know what happens next, don't you?
SEND IN THE CLOWNS!
The clowns spill into the ring, all sorts of them! There's Harlequin and Pierrot, Auguste and Tramp. There's Bozos and Ronalds and Clarabelles and Krustys. Hopefully no Gacys, but there's so many of them that it's hard to know for sure.
One of these clowns - the one you hate the most, of course - approaches you in the stands. With comically exaggerated movements, it leans close to you and whispers...Well. It whispers horrible things to you, really. It recounts to you some instance in your life where you delighted in the suffering of another, a moment where you really and truly were happy that somebody else was hurt. It's not a moment to be proud of, for sure, but as the clown tells your own secret shameful joy to you, you start to laugh. Really laugh - soon you're bent over double, tears running down your face, absolutely howling with laughter.
Your stomach hurts, and you're running out of breath. Very soon you won't be able to breathe at all.
Eventually, one of your fellow travelers won't be able to resist asking you, "What's so funny?"
The only way to stop laughing is to tell them. Otherwise you're going to pass out right where you sit, a creepy clown leering over you the whole time. Maybe your fellow traveler will be nice enough to drag you out of there if that happens, because if you're left alone? Everybody knows clowns get so much scarier alone in the dark.
Notes:
1. What happens if you really do get ditched with the clowns? Great question. Maybe they make you one of them. Maybe they eat you. Maybe you just wake up in the Big Top dressing room and see all the clowns smoking cigars and taking their floppy shoes off to film Clown Foot Erotica.
Palamedes Sextus | The Locked Tomb - spoilers for the series
Palamedes is suspicious of the Ferryman which is why he doesn't linger and pester the creature with endless questions. It doesn't do to show all of his cards at first, including the card that reveals he can be relentless when he gets his mind focused on someone. It isn't a human, he can tell that much, and he writes it off for now as a revenant to worry about later. This Ancient is the real game.
But very unlike him, he doesn't go poking around looking for said Ancient. Instead, Palamedes takes a few fucking minutes to sit down, put his hand in his hands, and deal with the fact he's actually breathing. That means he was not able to pull off the dramatic attack he planned for, and somehow he's here instead. This is not an afterlife. There is no logical explanation. So you know what, he decides to have some tea. He just cannot even right now. If someone wants to join him, they're welcome to.
After a minor mental breakdown in which he did not, repeat not, shed some very unnecessary and irrational tears, he gets up and puts together his pack. The answers aren't coming here and the calm is only unnerving at this point. Palamedes seems like a man on a mission, not lingering long enough in the safer temple to sleep or rest. He packs up what he can and then heads out to whatever this 'new island' nonsense is.
"After you," he says politely to another new person as they both step onto the boat headed toward the new port. When they get closer, he adjusts his glasses, narrowing his eyes. "Screams and music, that's not ominous at all." He tightens his hands around his pack, the only sign that he's affected by it, ready to face the next step.
II. Arrival to Carnival things!
So the screams weren't what he expected. They appear to be happy screams, which is not something he's experienced. This is truly outside of his realm of understanding. Palamedes looks genuinely lost but also curious as he wanders the carnival, looking everywhere, turning as he does, logging every detail to obsess over later. It seems this is supposed to be ... fun? Not Sixth's version of fun, or any other House's version of fun that he can think of.
While experience is helpful, nothing is going to get him on any of these rides, thanks. There is this ominous cloud over everything, he can feel the energy in the air. Or maybe it's the whole being kidnapped to another plane of existence that really has him indifferent to the adrenaline rush of a spinny ride. He accidentally runs into several people while walking, too focused on the details and not on helpful things like spatial awareness.
Palamedes takes one look at the giant bell and grimaces. Physical strength has never been his strong suit, and that's immediately his assumption here. Incorrectly, maybe, but he's not interested in participating right away. He ends up in the carnival version of the temple eventually, sitting down and attempting to boil water over that deeply unimpressive little cooking top there. "I should've stayed at the other place," he mutters.
III. Hall of Mirrors
Palamedes knows he's not going to get answers or 'whys' by walking around with his mouth open, so eventually he decides he has to do something here. The Haunted House would show him nothing that would actually scare him, necromancers have a tougher spine than that, but he doesn't expect to be shooed into the Hall of Mirrors with someone else. He glances over at the other person with an uncertain smile. "For safety, I suppose." That does not bode well. Up until recently there was someone literally killing everyone around him in a creepy game of hers, so he really should just go 'room of nightmares' and walk out. But here he is instead.
Palamedes is very tall and sickly thin, his dark hair tousled and a pair of thick glasses cover up steady gray eyes. "Interesting," he murmurs as the mirrors concave and warps. A fun little trick, one scientifically sound but visually intriguing. He runs his hands over the smooth glass to try and get a sense of where it ends.
The image shifts and shows him as something very familiar to him: a skeleton. His face with the skin barely hanging on the bones, his eye sockets empty, no actual expression. Palamedes' lips thin and he presses them together, although the mirror doesn't show that. "Rude." Then he finds the exit apparently blocked by more of the same and he pinches the bridge of his nose over his glasses, taking a calming breath in and out.
"I'm Palamedes Sextus," he informs the black marker. Nothing happens. "Oh fuck off."
IV. Hit me with whatever!
[Message me on waftingcurtains on plurk! Or whatever. I'm totally fine with brackets I just start with prose. I will be replying here with planned starts, lmk if you want one.]
Starter for Dulcinea!
He realizes that he sort of stands out; he's sort of hovering and staring at people, including the kids stepping off of it - were they on there before? - and he prides himself on at least generally acting like he's fine at all times. Palamedes ends up in a line, he thinks for some of that popcorn, and instead he is handed an absolutely obscene giant fluff of blue cotton candy. It's bigger than his head.
"Oh I don't think so ---" He doesn't know what this is but he does know that it could very well end up being something that decides to suffocate him or some other nasty trick. Maybe he's being paranoid or maybe they were recently being picked off one by one with a mentally unstable Lyctor, who knows. Some of it manages to stick to his glasses which immediately throws him off balance.
"Hi could you hold this for a minute? Or forever? This could fit a family inside of it." Palamedes does not see the person he is handing the cotton candy to but luckily it may be a certain someone with a sweet tooth.
For Camilla
"Well, I am the greatest necromancer of my generation." There is no Harrow here to disagree with him so he is going to state it as fact, at least not as far as he knwos now. He may not be a Lyctor but his knowledge base is vast. The Archivists would flip out if they knew. He was very certain it would work, but there were always possibilities that she couldn't get his bones together or the soul would have not connected the way it was supposed to. "I told you so."
He knows the lengths she probably had to go to in order to put him together again may have been complicated. All on the chance he was right. But she was Camilla Hect. She is the only one who could have done it, determined and focused and the smartest person he knows outside of himself. Sorry to everyone else, intelligence is gauged differently in Sixth House.
Palamedes lets her draw her hand away, although they still stay close physically. He nods at the question. "Mmm, yes. An interesting construct. I couldn't tell for certain what it was, but it is not like us." He could spend more time studying the Ferryman later if at all possible. He has always been good at breaking beings down into studied pieces. "I don't intend to take what it says at face value. We'll have to find this Ancient."
The temple they're in is deceptively calm and peaceful, just as their last stop was before all the puzzles and deaths started. It feels nice and therefore Palamedes is very skeptical considering nothing about this should feel nice. Outside of her. "I doubt we will find it anywhere obvious here."
ongoing locked tomb spoilers
But he's back, and so now she gets to ease back into this: shedding responsibility and letting him take the lead instead.
She cranes her head to look up at the endless temple sprawling above them. The High Temple, the Ferryman had said, although she hadn't been able to dredge much more information out of him (it?) about the place. But then again, how is that any different from cryptically vague Teacher, not telling them anything about Canaan House?
Answer: it isn't.
So the look she gives Palamedes now is familiar, a kind of quiet delight in the pair of them being together again, and doing what the Sixth does best: solving mysteries. "Does that mean it's time to explore, Warden?"
II. Arrival to Carnival things! -- at "still near test your strenth" bit
She's not wrong.
"Buddy, (P/p)al, friend," Gideon declares from a few body lengths away. "Kindly, what the fuck?!?"
no subject
He pauses and recognizes the voice before he turns so by the time he faces her there's that small wry smile on his lips. He looks the exact same as when she last saw him, adjusting the glasses on his nose. It's hilarious that at one point he thought she was this severe and silent Ninth muscle, and then she opened her mouth and he found his observation up until then greatly lacking.
"Hello Gideon." Palamedes says calmy with a casual nod, like this is all perfectly normal. "I suppose I should apologize."
no subject
Her mouth opens and closes. Gideon reconsiders what she almost said. “Out of curiosity, which parts do you think you should apologize for?” Gideon asks, instead. That isn’t what she came over for, but she still doesn’t understand why he did it. Sure, they both sacrificed themselves to kill Cytherea, and yes it’s probable they wouldn’t have managed it without their little Sex Pal cancer bomb. Gideon only did it once they were backed into a corner. Palamedes and his big dumb gray eyes, however, … Gideon still doesn’t quite get him.
I
Somewhere between Palamedes's tears and his getting his pack together, Malcolm finds the tea pot and helps himself to some tea. He ends up sitting down next to the woeful young man.
"You don't seem very excited about the carnival," he says before taking a sip of his tea.
no subject
He looks truly sickly as do all necromancers, barely strong enough to hold a sword for more than a few minutes at most, like a strong gust of wind could knock him over. Tall but skin and bones. He takes off his glasses and cleans them, glad these are clean robes instead of the blood and dirt he was just covered in.
"That's because it has nefarious energy and I have absolutely no patience for such bullshit right now."
no subject
"Do you plan to hang out in here all day then?" Malcolm asks.
I
"It sounds like an amusement park to me," she comments lightly. So - no, not ominous, actually.
no subject
"It's giving off ...." He pauses and then squints, looking back at the park. "Odd energy."
no subject
Chloe raises an eyebrow curiously. She's met a few strange characters since her arrival here, but most of them seem aware of at least the basic concept of this place. What sort of world is he from that he doesn't?
"I don't know about energy. It's just a place people go to play probably-rigged games, ride dangerous and rickety carnival rides, and eat food that's all been deep fat fried and will give you high cholesterol."
no subject
The description she gives does paint a clearer picture and it's a relief to put in boxes what he thought was a mystery. The laugher could be from rides and games, yes. The loud noises from the same. There is a whiff of food on the air, a lot of it strange to him, and that all fits.
"If the Ferryman is to be believed, we are sent to these places to seek redemption, so I don't think it's safe to assume any place we go is just anything. It's a test."
no subject
Even the guy from a planet where horses have six legs didn't seem too fazed by the whole carnival thing. And yet, this person looks and sounds human to her.
Wild.
"Well, that's a given," she says after a moment. "What sort of test, I suppose is up to use to figure out. I just hope there aren't any creepy clowns."
There are definitely creepy clowns.