Jonathan Strange (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
kingsroads) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
livinglot2018-05-15 08:45 pm
kingsroads) wrote in livinglot2018-05-15 08:45 pm
quick & dirty plot catch up
this was mentioned in chat as something useful for people on hiatus + people who are new + people who don't have the time to read 300+ comments of npc threads. sooo, here's a state of what's going on so far
brief note! this recap is for ooc purposes only. Characters still gotta icly distribute and talk about what they learned among themselves
Why're We Here
The carnival is at the Atheanaeum to look for information on the Queen's Miracles, three objects of immense power that were jointly created by Summer & Winter Courts. The carnival already has one of them: the BLUE ROSE. A lot of people got information on the SILVER MIRROR and a few people got some information on THE THIRD ONE which is a red beast that can think and feel. The carnival is looking for the Miracles because the Summer and Winter courts have it out for the carnival and want to kidnap members of the carnival/generally make live a living hell for the Ringmaster. Obviously, this is not good. With the power of the Miracles, the Ringmaster & the rest would be able to fight back.
Handy NPC Cheat Sheet
Most of these NPCs were encountered in an event the game had a year or so ago. The event was an alternate universe event (set in Portland & generally referred to as Portland) where some of the fae & some of the characters had au relations (which explains the whole 'fake mom' stuff)
SUMMER COURT
ROSE QUEEN: Steven Universe's AU mom and a high-ranking member of the Summer Court. big ol'weirdo, major bad news and majorly obsessed with Steven.
NIGHTSHADE: Rose Queen's lackey, has beef with like 75% of the carnival. has poisoned, brainwashed, attacked, cursed, & generally been a nuisance to everybody.
IGNATIUS: Rita was an AU changeling of him, big fire punch guy, knocked out a few carnival members during a fight scene
WINTER COURT
COUNT OF CROWS: Childermass's AU dad. super mysterious! his m.o. is birds, shadows, and being hella standoffish.
FROST: lower level lackey, mischievous, actually didn't show up in Portland but Strange summoned him one time b/c Strange is an idiot
LADY OF THE LAKE: this is her first time showing up here.
WYLD FAE (team leftovers)
THE RINGMASTER / RM / THE GREAT BEAST: you should know her, she's your boss! She apparently fucked up the Courts in some unspecified way and everyone's salty about it.
The PRINCE: current status, deceased. Was RM's uncle (of sorts) and the fae who originally stole the Blue Rose from the Courts. The Carnival stole the Rose from him, then RM ate him. She does this a lot.
aaaand here's a recap of what's going on in the npc threads post. shout out to Leah who wrote the write-ups for Team Wildfire and Team Lake that I shamelessly copy/pasted
Team Lake
Herbert and Lapis came across a pond in the library. Assuming it was a Library Story they engaged with it, talking to a naked lady with seaweed hair who was lying in the pond. After asking a bunch of creepy questions about death, she abruptly dragged Lapis in with seaweed, and used magic so that Lapis, who previously didn't need to breathe, was suddenly drowning.
Meanwhile, Herbert contacted the Carnival and asked for advice, eventually taking the advice of a literal child and creating a Hot Oil Sword to cut into the water. But he took too long, and Lapis took the deal to avoid dying offered by the water lady (discovered to be a fae, far too late). As Herbert sliced into the water with a magic sword, he saw Lapis get destabilised by the water fae, assumed she had disappeared entirely, and ran back to the Carnival to get help.
Team Pixies
Gon, Yuya, and Peridot encounter Nightshade and Frost playing keep-away with a book. The three of them join in and try to grab the book themselves, but Nightshade melts it with acid. She vanishes, one of Sans's skeleton dogs shows up (Roman), and everybody kind of forgets Frost exists for a moment. Frost then encases them all in an ice dome before he vanishes. Sans shows up and everybody manages to break out of the ice dome.
Team Wildfire
Coming across the smell of fire in the Library and intending to put it out, Strange found Ignatius, a Summer Court fae sent to help the Rose Queen. Meanwhile, Herbert had found Jasper, who insisted on dragging him along (quite literally) in her quest to find Lapis Lazuli, the ex she's still obsessed over. The two of them, including Zangetsu and Yuzu joined the group.
Ignatius announced that he had a meeting to attend and asked Strange for directions, and when asked for clarification, explained that he intended to meet up with Lapis who he was aware was interested in defecting. While the others tried to obscure their actual knowledge of Lapis, Herbert decided to directly tell Ignatius that she was gone in an attempt to make him leave.
It didn't work.
Instead, Ignatius changed his tack. Now, he would make an arrangement: if the others in the group wanted to leave alive, one of them was required to offer themself to him.
At this point, Rita busted into the group and challenged Ignatius to a fight. The party tried to ignore her and continue some sort of negotiation but Ignatius was already zeroed in on her due to Past Stuff and he created a wall of fire around the group to prevent escape. So Strange and Yuzu panicked and both tried to out-do each other offering themselves while Jasper and Zangetsu announced they would fight Ignatius instead. Rita punched Strange in the face for trying to sacrifice himself! Zangetsu made fun of Jasper's helmet! Ignatius had already set up the arrangement and couldn't back out but tried to get Rita to agree to be the sacrifice.
Meanwhile, Herbert subtly started broadcasting the arrangement on his radio while Rita used fire magic to create a slight gap in the fire wall. As Strange stepped forward to accept Ignatius' offer, Rita began to try to stop him with another spell, and Herbert decided he was done with the whole thing and tried to jump out through the gap. He caught on fire.
So did Strange, and became a pile of ash that Ignatius took with him as Rita threw a tidal wave at him and he disappeared.
The remaining group is currently wandering around crankily yelling at each other.
Team Rose Queen
Joker, Susan, Lauren, Papyrus, Steven's pet lion named Lion, Tyki, and Hinawa all encounter creepy vine-thorn creatures. Lauren's able to talk to them and man do they sound weird. The team manage to fight off the vine creatures and defeat one! The team meets up with Yuya and Gon as Lion leads the group to Steven. Thanks to Steven's empathy powers, he can tell the rest of the team that the vine-creatures were once people. Vines block them in a section of the library. The team tries to cut through the vines but are attacked by even more vine-creatures. Turns out those creatures are just buying time until the Rose Queen shows up.
Lion teleports Steven, Yuya, and Hinawa to the other side of the vines. They start trying to hack through the vines to get back to the rest of the group. On the other side of the vines, Rose Queen gets all creepy to the rest of the team and asks them to submit to her. Everybody refuses, Joker tries diplomacy, and Lauren attempts to cast a hailstorm. Unfortunately, the Rose Queen yanks him beneath the earth, making him MIA. Everybody freaks out a little and Susan really freaks out. Turns out the Rose Queen wants Steven. Obviously, everybody's like "no way" but Steven, Yuya, and Hinawa break through the vines and the Rose Queen kidnaps Steven anyway. Rose Queen lets them go and everybody skedaddles out through a hole in the vines. As a last act, Gon calls upon the power of creation to keep Steven from getting dead and Joker makes a radio post saying that the kidnapped total is now four.
Team Birds
Lambert, Childermass, Jasper, Peridot, Herbert, Sans, Shima, Rin, and Yugo all run into the Count of Crows. He's a cryptic asshole for a bit, welcoming them to his Elysium and asking them to justify why RM's stealing the miracles. (note: Elysium is a neutral discussion ground space for fae). Various justifications ensue and the Count of Crows drops the bombshell that RM killed & ate the old Winter Queen. This is a Big Fucking Deal and the Count tells the carnival members that they've got to pay for RM's crimes.
And then more fae start to show up: Frost, Nightshade, Ignatius. More arguing ensues before Lambert breaks a plot token to tell Ringmaster precisely where they are. She shows up and the Count gives her an offer: give Winter the Blue Rose and they'll spare everybody else. RM says 'no way,' Summer Court says 'we'd like the Rose plz,' and more arguing breaks out. The carnival members assembled point out that hey, if they want an unbiased account of what happened to the Winter Queen, just read something the Scribe wrote. People are debating that method (and calling Peridot out for beaning the Count with iron back in Portland) when the fae who stole Lapis wanders in, buckass nude, with Lapis around her neck.
Jasper flips the fuck out, charges the Lady of the Lake, and gets destabilized for her efforts. The Rose Queen shows up and Childermass tries diplomacy: bargaining the location of the Silver Mirror for all stolen carnival workers. Unfortunately for him, that requires the courts working together so that's a no go. A whole bunch of people insult the Rose Queen for basically doing fuckall to retrieve the Blue Rose herself. The Rose Queen gets the Count to disband Elysium so she can attack a bitch, the Count does so, the Count tries to enthrall Childermass. Childermass resists the willpower mindwhammy long enough for Rin and Shima to knock him unconscious and then all hell breaks loose.
TO BE CONTINUED as this thread is still going on, check back later.
PEOPLE CURRENTLY KIDNAPPED/INCAPACITATED: Lapis, Strange, Lauren, Steven, Jasper
since this is a quick and dirty recap, if you have more specific information about the plot, NPCs, want to write a more detailed thread recap, then comment below! I'll edit/link it into the body of the post itself
brief note! this recap is for ooc purposes only. Characters still gotta icly distribute and talk about what they learned among themselves
Why're We Here
The carnival is at the Atheanaeum to look for information on the Queen's Miracles, three objects of immense power that were jointly created by Summer & Winter Courts. The carnival already has one of them: the BLUE ROSE. A lot of people got information on the SILVER MIRROR and a few people got some information on THE THIRD ONE which is a red beast that can think and feel. The carnival is looking for the Miracles because the Summer and Winter courts have it out for the carnival and want to kidnap members of the carnival/generally make live a living hell for the Ringmaster. Obviously, this is not good. With the power of the Miracles, the Ringmaster & the rest would be able to fight back.
Handy NPC Cheat Sheet
Most of these NPCs were encountered in an event the game had a year or so ago. The event was an alternate universe event (set in Portland & generally referred to as Portland) where some of the fae & some of the characters had au relations (which explains the whole 'fake mom' stuff)
SUMMER COURT
ROSE QUEEN: Steven Universe's AU mom and a high-ranking member of the Summer Court. big ol'weirdo, major bad news and majorly obsessed with Steven.
NIGHTSHADE: Rose Queen's lackey, has beef with like 75% of the carnival. has poisoned, brainwashed, attacked, cursed, & generally been a nuisance to everybody.
IGNATIUS: Rita was an AU changeling of him, big fire punch guy, knocked out a few carnival members during a fight scene
WINTER COURT
COUNT OF CROWS: Childermass's AU dad. super mysterious! his m.o. is birds, shadows, and being hella standoffish.
FROST: lower level lackey, mischievous, actually didn't show up in Portland but Strange summoned him one time b/c Strange is an idiot
LADY OF THE LAKE: this is her first time showing up here.
WYLD FAE (team leftovers)
THE RINGMASTER / RM / THE GREAT BEAST: you should know her, she's your boss! She apparently fucked up the Courts in some unspecified way and everyone's salty about it.
The PRINCE: current status, deceased. Was RM's uncle (of sorts) and the fae who originally stole the Blue Rose from the Courts. The Carnival stole the Rose from him, then RM ate him. She does this a lot.
aaaand here's a recap of what's going on in the npc threads post. shout out to Leah who wrote the write-ups for Team Wildfire and Team Lake that I shamelessly copy/pasted
Team Lake
Herbert and Lapis came across a pond in the library. Assuming it was a Library Story they engaged with it, talking to a naked lady with seaweed hair who was lying in the pond. After asking a bunch of creepy questions about death, she abruptly dragged Lapis in with seaweed, and used magic so that Lapis, who previously didn't need to breathe, was suddenly drowning.
Meanwhile, Herbert contacted the Carnival and asked for advice, eventually taking the advice of a literal child and creating a Hot Oil Sword to cut into the water. But he took too long, and Lapis took the deal to avoid dying offered by the water lady (discovered to be a fae, far too late). As Herbert sliced into the water with a magic sword, he saw Lapis get destabilised by the water fae, assumed she had disappeared entirely, and ran back to the Carnival to get help.
Team Pixies
Gon, Yuya, and Peridot encounter Nightshade and Frost playing keep-away with a book. The three of them join in and try to grab the book themselves, but Nightshade melts it with acid. She vanishes, one of Sans's skeleton dogs shows up (Roman), and everybody kind of forgets Frost exists for a moment. Frost then encases them all in an ice dome before he vanishes. Sans shows up and everybody manages to break out of the ice dome.
Team Wildfire
Coming across the smell of fire in the Library and intending to put it out, Strange found Ignatius, a Summer Court fae sent to help the Rose Queen. Meanwhile, Herbert had found Jasper, who insisted on dragging him along (quite literally) in her quest to find Lapis Lazuli, the ex she's still obsessed over. The two of them, including Zangetsu and Yuzu joined the group.
Ignatius announced that he had a meeting to attend and asked Strange for directions, and when asked for clarification, explained that he intended to meet up with Lapis who he was aware was interested in defecting. While the others tried to obscure their actual knowledge of Lapis, Herbert decided to directly tell Ignatius that she was gone in an attempt to make him leave.
It didn't work.
Instead, Ignatius changed his tack. Now, he would make an arrangement: if the others in the group wanted to leave alive, one of them was required to offer themself to him.
At this point, Rita busted into the group and challenged Ignatius to a fight. The party tried to ignore her and continue some sort of negotiation but Ignatius was already zeroed in on her due to Past Stuff and he created a wall of fire around the group to prevent escape. So Strange and Yuzu panicked and both tried to out-do each other offering themselves while Jasper and Zangetsu announced they would fight Ignatius instead. Rita punched Strange in the face for trying to sacrifice himself! Zangetsu made fun of Jasper's helmet! Ignatius had already set up the arrangement and couldn't back out but tried to get Rita to agree to be the sacrifice.
Meanwhile, Herbert subtly started broadcasting the arrangement on his radio while Rita used fire magic to create a slight gap in the fire wall. As Strange stepped forward to accept Ignatius' offer, Rita began to try to stop him with another spell, and Herbert decided he was done with the whole thing and tried to jump out through the gap. He caught on fire.
So did Strange, and became a pile of ash that Ignatius took with him as Rita threw a tidal wave at him and he disappeared.
The remaining group is currently wandering around crankily yelling at each other.
Team Rose Queen
Joker, Susan, Lauren, Papyrus, Steven's pet lion named Lion, Tyki, and Hinawa all encounter creepy vine-thorn creatures. Lauren's able to talk to them and man do they sound weird. The team manage to fight off the vine creatures and defeat one! The team meets up with Yuya and Gon as Lion leads the group to Steven. Thanks to Steven's empathy powers, he can tell the rest of the team that the vine-creatures were once people. Vines block them in a section of the library. The team tries to cut through the vines but are attacked by even more vine-creatures. Turns out those creatures are just buying time until the Rose Queen shows up.
Lion teleports Steven, Yuya, and Hinawa to the other side of the vines. They start trying to hack through the vines to get back to the rest of the group. On the other side of the vines, Rose Queen gets all creepy to the rest of the team and asks them to submit to her. Everybody refuses, Joker tries diplomacy, and Lauren attempts to cast a hailstorm. Unfortunately, the Rose Queen yanks him beneath the earth, making him MIA. Everybody freaks out a little and Susan really freaks out. Turns out the Rose Queen wants Steven. Obviously, everybody's like "no way" but Steven, Yuya, and Hinawa break through the vines and the Rose Queen kidnaps Steven anyway. Rose Queen lets them go and everybody skedaddles out through a hole in the vines. As a last act, Gon calls upon the power of creation to keep Steven from getting dead and Joker makes a radio post saying that the kidnapped total is now four.
Team Birds
Lambert, Childermass, Jasper, Peridot, Herbert, Sans, Shima, Rin, and Yugo all run into the Count of Crows. He's a cryptic asshole for a bit, welcoming them to his Elysium and asking them to justify why RM's stealing the miracles. (note: Elysium is a neutral discussion ground space for fae). Various justifications ensue and the Count of Crows drops the bombshell that RM killed & ate the old Winter Queen. This is a Big Fucking Deal and the Count tells the carnival members that they've got to pay for RM's crimes.
And then more fae start to show up: Frost, Nightshade, Ignatius. More arguing ensues before Lambert breaks a plot token to tell Ringmaster precisely where they are. She shows up and the Count gives her an offer: give Winter the Blue Rose and they'll spare everybody else. RM says 'no way,' Summer Court says 'we'd like the Rose plz,' and more arguing breaks out. The carnival members assembled point out that hey, if they want an unbiased account of what happened to the Winter Queen, just read something the Scribe wrote. People are debating that method (and calling Peridot out for beaning the Count with iron back in Portland) when the fae who stole Lapis wanders in, buckass nude, with Lapis around her neck.
Jasper flips the fuck out, charges the Lady of the Lake, and gets destabilized for her efforts. The Rose Queen shows up and Childermass tries diplomacy: bargaining the location of the Silver Mirror for all stolen carnival workers. Unfortunately for him, that requires the courts working together so that's a no go. A whole bunch of people insult the Rose Queen for basically doing fuckall to retrieve the Blue Rose herself. The Rose Queen gets the Count to disband Elysium so she can attack a bitch, the Count does so, the Count tries to enthrall Childermass. Childermass resists the willpower mindwhammy long enough for Rin and Shima to knock him unconscious and then all hell breaks loose.
TO BE CONTINUED as this thread is still going on, check back later.
PEOPLE CURRENTLY KIDNAPPED/INCAPACITATED: Lapis, Strange, Lauren, Steven, Jasper
since this is a quick and dirty recap, if you have more specific information about the plot, NPCs, want to write a more detailed thread recap, then comment below! I'll edit/link it into the body of the post itself
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Also, the Queen's Miracles were produced jointly by the Summer and Winter Courts, in a time before they went to war, thereby being practically mythical.
Also for completion's sake on the NPC list, you can probably put down
WYLD FAE
The Ringmaster, aka RM, aka the Great Beast: you should know her, she's your boss! She apparently fucked up the Courts in some unspecified way and everyone's salty about it.
The Prince: current status, deceased. Was RM's uncle (of sorts) and the fae who originally stole the Blue Rose from the Courts. The Carnival stole the Rose from him, then RM ate him. She does this a lot.
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Rita's been compiling information ICly, though some of the info I have there hasn't yet been cleared for her to ICly obtain, so consider it an OOC reference for now.
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With the Count's Elysium dispelled, the uncaptured Carnival members are able to return to Carnival grounds while the Ringmaster fights and successfully manages to fend off the other fae in the library... for now.
While their coworkers recuperate from their encounter with fae, Lambert's taken a small group back out into the library to go searching for the Scribe and Curator, in the hopes they may have the ability as this realm's masters to affect the conflict. Much to their annoyance, they're greeted with an exasperated Scribe and Curator, who inform them that they're more than aware of everything going on, and that they're disappointed that the Carnival hasn't already mobilized the best defense available to them: the Athenaeum's own stories.
In the same way you have turned the tides against our works of fiction, you must turn this story against them, the Scribe tells them. (When they fail to get the point, they transform into a version of Lambert who previously wielded the power of the Earth Spirit to save Childermass to demonstrate, much to Lambert's lack of amusement). Whether drawn from reality or fiction, the power to defeat the fae lies in telling a story in which the Carnival are the victors that save their friends and save the day.
The only question is, exactly what story is the Carnival going to create now?