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👻🎃🤡
✖ THE CARNIVAL
Ⅰ. THE TEMPLES
There's a subtle shift in the music you will hear drifting on the wind this month - gone is the calliope that screams just a little too loud, replaced instead by circus music that sounds cheerful and bright. The thrill rides are still undercut by rock music, but it seems less sinister. Any time you venture out, you'll find the people milling about are smiling, and none of those smiles seem like screams turned upside down.
The Caravan Temple remains - 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.
Access to the High Temple is also available to all Travelers this month.
Ⅱ. CONCERT AND CANDY
CW: alcohol and drug use, sax music.
It wouldn't be a carnival if you didn't eat like a garbage disposal.
There's corndogs, deep fried mars bars, popcorn, donuts, funnel cakes, cheese fries, lemonade, burgers... Go on. Eat like you have a personal vendetta against your gastrointestinal tract. And of course you ought to help yourself to some cotton candy, because what's a fair without cotton candy?
There's pink and there's blue. Whichever colour you choose, you'll find that you start to feel a little funny after you eat it.
The pink cotton candy will fill you with a sense of pleasant euphoria. You'll find it easier to talk to people, and you'll find them just so much more pleasant than usual. You'll be empathetic, and just filled with love for life. You might even want to hug people, even if you're not usually the touchy feely type. You just feel so good.
The blue cotton candy will also make you feel good, but it's more mellow than the pink - you don't want to run around hugging people so much as you want to just chill out somewhere. You'll feel very relaxed, very open to talking to others about deep subjects like whether or not Kubrick really did fake the moon landing, man. Everything seems just a little more amusing, a little easier to handle.
To make things even better, there are outdoor concerts at night. No matter what band is on stage, you find yourself really enjoying it, even if the music isn’t usually your thing. There are kegs of beer set up around the edges of the concert area and you’re free to help yourself.
All that cotton candy and cheap beer might impair your judgement a little. Maybe... enough to get a tattoo? Calm down, they’re temporary. There’s a stand called Pirate Pete’s on the midway not far from the concert where a guy dressed as a pirate - Pete, presumably - will be happy to draw whatever you want on your choice of body part.
Whatever you wind up getting, you’ll find that whenever you or someone else touches it you’ll experience a vision of a memory associated with the imagery of your tattoo. So if you get a snarling wolf, you might experience a memory of a time you treated someone savagely. If you get ‘Mom’ in a heart, maybe you and whoever else happens to brush against it will see a memory of your dear old mother. Gosh, this could get revealing or embarrassing fast!
Fucking Pete.
Ⅲ. TUNNEL OF LOVE
CW: potentially sexual content
Maybe it's the cotton candy, or maybe you're just really captivated by the swan boats, but you find yourself drawn to one of the cheesiest rides in the place: the Tunnel of Love.
You can't ride alone, of course - this is the sort of thing meant for two! The guy running the ride ushers one of your fellow travelers on with you, then wolf-whistles, imitates a cat noise and a bed squeaking, then purrs, pants, barks, howls, twiddle his lips and says. “Hubba hubba!”
He ignores you when you glare at him.
The inside of the tunnel is surprisingly pleasant - it does not, as a matter of fact, smell of stale water or unmentionable bodily fluids. The water you're floating on is crisp and clear, like a real spring, and alongside either side of it are miniature rolling hills of what looks like real grass. The lights are low and pinkish, casting a soft glow over everything.
And they're playing one of your favourite songs on the speakers! Whatever that may be.
As you ride along, you'll start to think that your companion is just incredibly witty and intelligent and good looking. These feelings may be sexual or romantic, or they may be perfectly platonic - the result either way is that you really, really think this person is just the absolute greatest. You might find yourself telling them things you never would normally. Or doing things you might not otherwise…
Of course, the second you're off the ride you might find all of those fuzzy feelings depart. Better hope you didn't do anything TOO embarrassing.
Ⅳ. HAUNTED HOUSE
CW: violence, blood
You might be on carnival island, but it’s still October. It’s time to get spooky! And what better way to do that than to take a ride through the haunted house?
A bearded fellow in half-assed clown makeup and an Uncle Sam costume loads you onto a small rail car with at least one other person. It rolls forward along the bumpy tracks into darkness. Not that it stays totally dark for long - sickly lights illuminate animatronics and mannequins posed alongside the track. There are foam cemeteries and giant rubber spiders galore.
As you move further and further into the attraction the better the decorations get. Those rubber spiders now look awfully real, and that bat that just dive bombed the car sure seemed legit.
Suddenly the car jerks to a halt. You peer around in the gloom, and then lights go up.
One bathes a coffin in red. Another illuminates a gravestone in green. The last is a facsimile of the moon itself, pale and silver.
Before you can do more than wonder what the heck is going on, one of these attractions splits open and a monster leaps toward you. A vampire, a ghost, or a werewolf respectively. If you’re quick you can get out of the way and run for the exit.
If you’re not?
The vampire’s teeth sink into your veins. The ghost’s cold hand wraps around your heart. The werewolf’s claws tear your flesh.
You’re lucky in that it doesn’t kill you; somehow you manage to get away and stumble outside, where you swiftly discover that the rest of your month is going to be pretty goddamn strange as you transform right then and there into whatever monster attacked you.
That’s right, for the month of October you may have to figure out a way to deal with cravings for flesh and blood, or how to get anything done when objects just fall right through your glowing hands.
You may be understandably upset about this. If you return to the Haunted House and accost the guy running it, he’ll tell you that the only way to break the curse is to admit to why you see yourself as that monstrous archetype. Now piss off, he ain’t got time for your jackassy questions.
The kind of jams that last all night.
There's a subtle shift in the music you will hear drifting on the wind this month - gone is the calliope that screams just a little too loud, replaced instead by circus music that sounds cheerful and bright. The thrill rides are still undercut by rock music, but it seems less sinister. Any time you venture out, you'll find the people milling about are smiling, and none of those smiles seem like screams turned upside down.
The Caravan Temple remains - 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.
Access to the High Temple is also available to all Travelers this month.
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. Your character will revert to their true age if they were affected by the carousel last 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. Have fun!
Ⅱ. CONCERT AND CANDY
CW: alcohol and drug use, sax music.
It wouldn't be a carnival if you didn't eat like a garbage disposal.
There's corndogs, deep fried mars bars, popcorn, donuts, funnel cakes, cheese fries, lemonade, burgers... Go on. Eat like you have a personal vendetta against your gastrointestinal tract. And of course you ought to help yourself to some cotton candy, because what's a fair without cotton candy?
There's pink and there's blue. Whichever colour you choose, you'll find that you start to feel a little funny after you eat it.
The pink cotton candy will fill you with a sense of pleasant euphoria. You'll find it easier to talk to people, and you'll find them just so much more pleasant than usual. You'll be empathetic, and just filled with love for life. You might even want to hug people, even if you're not usually the touchy feely type. You just feel so good.
The blue cotton candy will also make you feel good, but it's more mellow than the pink - you don't want to run around hugging people so much as you want to just chill out somewhere. You'll feel very relaxed, very open to talking to others about deep subjects like whether or not Kubrick really did fake the moon landing, man. Everything seems just a little more amusing, a little easier to handle.
To make things even better, there are outdoor concerts at night. No matter what band is on stage, you find yourself really enjoying it, even if the music isn’t usually your thing. There are kegs of beer set up around the edges of the concert area and you’re free to help yourself.All that cotton candy and cheap beer might impair your judgement a little. Maybe... enough to get a tattoo? Calm down, they’re temporary. There’s a stand called Pirate Pete’s on the midway not far from the concert where a guy dressed as a pirate - Pete, presumably - will be happy to draw whatever you want on your choice of body part.
Whatever you wind up getting, you’ll find that whenever you or someone else touches it you’ll experience a vision of a memory associated with the imagery of your tattoo. So if you get a snarling wolf, you might experience a memory of a time you treated someone savagely. If you get ‘Mom’ in a heart, maybe you and whoever else happens to brush against it will see a memory of your dear old mother. Gosh, this could get revealing or embarrassing fast!
Fucking Pete.
Notes:
1. Any food found on the midway is consumable by non-human entities. The cotton candy will likewise affect anyone who is not human.
2. I still believe.
3. The memory can be one that your character has repressed or forgotten.
Ⅲ. TUNNEL OF LOVE
CW: potentially sexual content
Maybe it's the cotton candy, or maybe you're just really captivated by the swan boats, but you find yourself drawn to one of the cheesiest rides in the place: the Tunnel of Love.
You can't ride alone, of course - this is the sort of thing meant for two! The guy running the ride ushers one of your fellow travelers on with you, then wolf-whistles, imitates a cat noise and a bed squeaking, then purrs, pants, barks, howls, twiddle his lips and says. “Hubba hubba!”He ignores you when you glare at him.
The inside of the tunnel is surprisingly pleasant - it does not, as a matter of fact, smell of stale water or unmentionable bodily fluids. The water you're floating on is crisp and clear, like a real spring, and alongside either side of it are miniature rolling hills of what looks like real grass. The lights are low and pinkish, casting a soft glow over everything.
And they're playing one of your favourite songs on the speakers! Whatever that may be.
As you ride along, you'll start to think that your companion is just incredibly witty and intelligent and good looking. These feelings may be sexual or romantic, or they may be perfectly platonic - the result either way is that you really, really think this person is just the absolute greatest. You might find yourself telling them things you never would normally. Or doing things you might not otherwise…
Of course, the second you're off the ride you might find all of those fuzzy feelings depart. Better hope you didn't do anything TOO embarrassing.
Notes:
1. Only for characters of age havin the intercourse, please.
2. If your characters want to get naughty, they may discover that these swan boats have a little glove box containing condoms, lube and the like. You could also just fill the former up with water and throw them at that guy running the ride when it's over.
Ⅳ. HAUNTED HOUSE
CW: violence, blood
You might be on carnival island, but it’s still October. It’s time to get spooky! And what better way to do that than to take a ride through the haunted house?
A bearded fellow in half-assed clown makeup and an Uncle Sam costume loads you onto a small rail car with at least one other person. It rolls forward along the bumpy tracks into darkness. Not that it stays totally dark for long - sickly lights illuminate animatronics and mannequins posed alongside the track. There are foam cemeteries and giant rubber spiders galore.
As you move further and further into the attraction the better the decorations get. Those rubber spiders now look awfully real, and that bat that just dive bombed the car sure seemed legit.
Suddenly the car jerks to a halt. You peer around in the gloom, and then lights go up.
One bathes a coffin in red. Another illuminates a gravestone in green. The last is a facsimile of the moon itself, pale and silver.
Before you can do more than wonder what the heck is going on, one of these attractions splits open and a monster leaps toward you. A vampire, a ghost, or a werewolf respectively. If you’re quick you can get out of the way and run for the exit.
If you’re not?
The vampire’s teeth sink into your veins. The ghost’s cold hand wraps around your heart. The werewolf’s claws tear your flesh.
You’re lucky in that it doesn’t kill you; somehow you manage to get away and stumble outside, where you swiftly discover that the rest of your month is going to be pretty goddamn strange as you transform right then and there into whatever monster attacked you.That’s right, for the month of October you may have to figure out a way to deal with cravings for flesh and blood, or how to get anything done when objects just fall right through your glowing hands.
You may be understandably upset about this. If you return to the Haunted House and accost the guy running it, he’ll tell you that the only way to break the curse is to admit to why you see yourself as that monstrous archetype. Now piss off, he ain’t got time for your jackassy questions.
Notes:
1. To return to their natural state, your character must reveal a personality trait or incident that would correspond to the monster they’ve turned into. For example, a person turned vampire might talk about how they feel they drain other people’s energy with their problems, or that they feel drained by other people’s. A ghost might not be able to let go of the past, and a werewolf might have anger issues. Interpret as you will!
2. The monsters can abide by any monster rules that you like. Is your vampire a Twilight vampire or a Dracula? It’s up to you!
3. The horror ride guy is weirdly impervious to harm.
4. All characters will return to normal at the end of October.
no subject
He points over to the west side of the fair. "It's over there." In the opposite direction of where they're headed.
no subject
"Am I going to have to give you a flea bath? Check you for ticks?" he teases.
The line up for that rollercoaster isn't long, but when they step into it Quentin realizes for the first time just how public this particular display of affection might be.
no subject
He rolls his eyes. "I think you're just looking for an excuse to get me in the tub."
It's extremely public. Really the only place they might not be noticed is in the very last car, but it seems likely they'll be loaded on somewhere in the middle. Kyle, unperturbed, keeps groping gently at Quentin while they wait.
no subject
"It's definitely a plus," he smirks and slaps at Kyle's grabby hands like it's a game of whack-a-mole. "But I'll take it back if you end up smelling like a wet dog."
When the line shuffles up and they're seated on this ride Quentin takes in their surroundings. "Ok real talk— have you ever had sex in public before?"
no subject
The safety bar lowered, Kyle grins and shakes his head.
"Never. How hard could it be?" Overcome by his ow wit, he cackles.
no subject
"It might not be hard at all, that's exactly my concern," Quentin mumbles and rolls his eyes. "Whatever. I can control the privacy. You just mind the claws how about."
no subject
"You taste good," Kyle growls over the sound of the ride starting to move.
no subject
He shivers a little until those teeth pull a little squeak out of him too. "You're so bitey," he mutters turning pink when he notices someone in the car before them turning around to see what he's making noise about.
Quentin's eyes go pink and he glowers back, "nothing to see here," he grumbles and as if on cue they take on an empty-eyed smile and turn their gaze elsewhere onto the scenery.
no subject
Quentin really is a risk taker if he's trusting those paws not to squeeze too hard when the cars drop.
no subject
His face is almost the color of his hair as their coaster climbs to its pinnacle. "Is that what this is?" he smiles. There's something adorable and oh so understandable about Kyle using this to a little more forward or demanding. "God, even when you're like something that crawled out from under the Jersey turnpike, you're weirdly adorable. C'mere you stupid wolf boy," he mutters, and drags Kyle closer by a handful of his shirt for a kiss that's finally neither reserved nor preoccupied with their current situation.
cw: nsfw
And then the cars drop, rocketing down and screaming around corners and loops. Miraculously Kyle doesn't bite Quentin's lips off, just sits back and howls with laughter. He keeps his hand in Quentin's lap, though.
cw: nsfw
He squirms in his seat when he ends up hard under Kyle's hand by the time the coaster clicks and whirrs at the top. The between the stomach twisting drop of the ride, Kyle's ridiculous laugh and his own hard on there's much too much to concentrate on for Quentin to be controlling the minds of potential onlookers as well.
It's briefly dizzying, but when his mouth opens it turns into an inward gasp, not a scream at all. His eyes shut tight and he clings to Kyle when gravity no longer promises to ground him.
cw: nsfw
The coaster rips around the track again but it's over all too soon.
cw: nsfw
"Ok so maybe rollercoaster handjobs are tricker than they sound," he snorts.
no subject
"I'm fuckin sorry, baby, I thought it was gonna be easy." He kisses the tip of Quentin's nose before climbing out of the coaster car. Stepping away from the ride his ears perk up suddenly and his nostrils flare.
"...dude. There's a petting zoo somewhere." He turns back to Quentin and kisses him hard.
"I'll meet you back at the trailer, babe, I gotta go get something to eat." Another kiss. "Before you look TOO tasty."
He lopes off, stops, and hollers back, "I'll be there in a bit! You have your sweet ass in bed so I can pound it!" Then need off again, presumably to make some children extremely unhappy.
no subject
"Wait, you're leaving me? To go eat rabbits!?" he means to look a little offended but Kyle's shameless hollering about his ass turns a few heads in the crowd and turns Quentin's face pink. "Fine, fine. But like... Brush your teeth first..." he mutters while Kyle heads off.
no subject
In fact, in spite of his rather lusty threat, Kyle doesn't return to their little caravan at all. No, instead he stumbles inside of it with the dawn, freshly showered and looking like seven shades of hungover garbage.
"Quentin?" he whispers miserably as he gropes his way to the bed. He's only wearing a towel, and barely at that. "Quentin?"
no subject
"Kyle?" he snuffles against his pillow and sits up to rub the sleep from his eyes. "Where the hell were you?"
cw: animal death
"I woke up covered in blood." He wraps an arm around Quentin's waist and admits, "I'm ninety percent certain I ate some fluffy bunnies and a bunch of dyed chickens."
Kyle peers at Quentin with red rimmed eyes. "I was with you, right? For a while? I remember a rollercoaster and... something about my ass?"
no subject
"A fight? With who? Or what?" without leaving the bed he strikes a match and lights a candle on the little table in their caravan. It's not enough to read by from all the way over here but it casts enough low light to let him get a look at his boyfriend.
"Yeah, we got your ass inked, you tried to give me a handy on the roller coaster and then said something about eating rabbits and fucked off," he wraps himself around Kyle and hauls the blankets up over both of them. "You're not as hairy. But you're not as happy either. What the hell happened, babe?"
no subject
He sighs gratefully when Quentin pulls him close, but then the rundown of his exploits has him groaning.
"Oh my GOD, I'm so sorry" he laments. "Fucking... I was so scared this would happen some day but then I always seemed fine when I was around Carter and he's from New Jersey..." He pauses.
"Wait, we tattooed my ass?!" His eyes go wide. "And you--! You got one! I remember touching it and seeing... a bird? Something exploding?" He shifts so he can see Quentin's eyes.
"What did I get?"
no subject
"Wait, I thought it was because you were bit by a werewolf... a werewolf from Seaside Heights or whatever I guess," he shrugs. "Carter did this to you somehow?"
He's just settling again when that revelation startled Kyle back into some anxious state. "Yeah it's a whole thing..." he mutters, dismissing the massive chest piece that pokes just slightly out of the tee shirt he wears. "You ahm... you got a little..." he draws the shape in the air with his finger and it leaves a slowly dissipating pink trail. "Omega," he grins a guilty grin.
no subject
Kyle stares, and then starts giggling. "I. Oh. Oh my god. I bet because I've had this song in my head for ages... here, listen." He puts his forehead o Quentin's and thinks.
"Your name on my ass tattooed," he says. "Oh my god you must think I'm so fucking clingy."
no subject
If there's a way to take Quentin from irritated to adoring, it's this. Kyle's unexpected effort at sharing positively warms Quentin's heart and so does that song when he brushes away the ambient thoughts to hear that tune and that voice alone. Soon enough he's giggling along with Kyle.
"You are clingy," he snickers but before Kyle has time to get neurotic about it Quentin grabs his face and kisses like he's trying to perform CPR. "I had no idea how much I'd be into that, but I am very into it," he says grinning his dopey grin and kissing Kyle again.
no subject
Kyle blushes red, but before he can start apologising Quentin is kissing him. Tired and embarrassed as he is, he has no problem finding the energy to kiss him back. He smiles back, hands coming up to brush over the sides of Quentin's head.
"You'll have to show me your tattoo again," he says softly before his lips part under Quentin's to welcome his tongue.
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