bluh bluh huge ball

[thalassino]

Characters: Vatheon
Location: That Castle
Time: Evening, on Sunday
Style: Any
Status: OPEN. Threadjack, threadhop, spam away!

[ Good evening, Ladies and Gentlemen of Vatheon— whatever your newfound stature may be, Prince, Princess, Knight, or Peasant, you will all receive a message on your SFC on the eve of Saturday regardless:

You are cordially invited to the castle for this evening's ball. In addition, you are all welcome to try and solve the riddle if it fancies you. It just may break the curse!

The invitation is unsigned, but its intentions are clear. Maybe you hadn't quite noticed the sizeable castle in the distance of the city that had sprung up, but this message would surely garner your attention toward it now.

Should you arrive at the castle, plenty of attractions await you:

Ballroom ❧ A very large and beautiful ballroom is lighted up, complete with a playing violin orchestra. While the curtains will be drawn during this event, there is a windowed view and exit on one side of the ballroom that leads to:

Smee's Rose Garden ❧ A broad and colorful spanse of a garden, complete with many paths and turns. Plenty of roses are arranged in great arches, which provide perfect little places should you need some privacy with your sweetheart. Anyone familiar will even tell you that the garden was purposefully designed for just that sort of thing.

The Riddle ❧ There is an inscription located on a noticeable plaque set in one of the garden's benches. It reads:

Two are necessary to break this curse
Riled up, upset, what kind of love?
Only this kiss will stop it from getting worse.
Look for a winged one is push comes to shove,
Look for a glance slightly dark,
Search for a pair in reluctant love.
One answers a call; that's your mark;
One longs for patria though adverse.

Dining Hall ❧ Connected to the ballroom is an extremely long hall that stretches as far as the eye can see, elegantly arranged as the dining area. Expensive and exquisite cuisine seem to be on the menu— try something new? Chances are you won't be eating from a selection such as this again anytime soon!

Dais ❧ There is a noticeable raised dais that is easily visible via any area within the ballroom. It's locked off from guests, though— what is it for...?

Do enjoy. ]

Comments

[withoutasign]

[It's a good thing Karkat is trying this with Signless, because he might be the only creature in Vatheon who wouldn't laugh at this sight. As it is, he has to bite the inside of his cheek.]

Sorry. It worked, but not the way you thought it would.

Maybe... instead of enchanting yourself, you could enchant me?

[bethehugejerk]

[It didn't? Karkat looks down at himself again, but that does no good. He's the one with the glamour, and he knows what he really looks like. That kills it.]

No, no, tell me, what did it make me look like? I don't think it would work in reverse either, the way it feels.

[withoutasign]

Weeeeell... you're still wearing the dress, unfortunately. But now, you look and sound like a girl too.

[Signless is sorry, son. Or daughter. Or whatever you are right now. Human family words are confusing.]

[bethehugejerk]

MOTHER OF FUCK!

[Another wave of the wand, or maybe it's more of a sharp jab, and the glamour breaks, almost literally. The image of Karkat-as-a-girl cracks and splinters apart, revealing one pissed off dude in a dress in its place.]

Can I have nothing go right this week? Not one single thing? Or am I fated, destined, nay, fucking cursed to explore the feminine side I do not particularly want? I get mocked enough for my investment in romance already, chick flicks they call them, but no, never enough. I need a dress and frills and a magical set of boobs before the cruel, merciless gods of my existence will be satisfied!

[withoutasign]

[Wait, Karkat has boobs in this form? Signless is so confused, this is all too much for a mousedad to take! He squeaks worriedly and starts running in circles around Karkat.]

Pick me up, pick me up, put me on your shoulder again!

[bethehugejerk]

[Shut up! He had them! They were... just small... not that Karkat would even know, when his goal was a knight. But it doesn't even matter now, because he's back to how he was before, no magic occluding him.]

[He grumbles and goes to pick up the Signless again, once he holds still long enough to to do it. Then it's back to the shoulder.]

Now what? It's not like you can fix it for me, my magic works the way it works and that's how it is.

[withoutasign]

[As soon as he's deposited on Karkat's shoulder, Signless is pressing himself up against the side of his neck, giving him a full-body, mousey hug, complete with wrapping his tail around the back of his neck. If he thought it would help, he'd climb onto Karkat's head and hug one of his horns, but something tells him that would just make things worse.]

I'm proud of you and love you no matter what you look like.

[bethehugejerk]

[Karkat just grumbles under his breath, letting his tiny mousedad hug his neck. It's fuzzy and it feels kind of odd, for all it's not the first time a mouse has ever hugged him. That spot belongs to Mrs. Brisby from the week she was a lusus (and he a pegasus pony).]

I still look dumb. The wings are cool and actually having a power good for something, but the rest? It sucks the most feculent of waste chutes like a pro.

[withoutasign]

I know, I know, shoosh...

[Signless starts gently patting the side of Karkat's neck with both front paws.]

It's okay, the curse should be broken soon and then your magic will be back to normal and you can change your outfit, shooooosh...

[bethehugejerk]

Are you--are you shooshing me? Stop that. I have Gamzee to do that and that is really weird coming from you.

[He may be coloring a little in the face.]

When the curse ends I won't have magic - [Cough.] - Dad.

[He's still getting the hang of that name.]

What I'll have is my sylladex and my actual fucking clothes again.

[withoutasign]

[Signless shooshes everyone. It's kind of his thing. But at Karkat's complaining, he stops, and instead tries to climb up on top of his head, so he can look down over his forehead at him. He does squeak with happiness, though, when Karkat calls him "Dad."]

So then you'll be back to normal, and you'll be happy again!

[bethehugejerk]

[Karkat certainly has hair enough to climb up, though he grumbles some at the action. Then there's a mouse peeking down over his face.]

If you want to look at me, I can hold you in my hands or something instead of you hanging off my face like you're asking to fall. But yes, I'll be back to normal, and about as happy as I ever get.

[withoutasign]

I've been doing this all week, I'm not going to fall.

[Have a goofy upside down mouse grin.]

Good. I like it when you're happy. You don't smile nearly enough.

[bethehugejerk]

That's the whole point: it'll be back to normal, not some great celebration. And I'm not just going to start smiling because you tell me to.

[withoutasign]

You act like smiling is painful.

[Signless leans out further, holding tight to Karkat's hair with his back paws.]

It really isn't. Trust me, I know.

[bethehugejerk]

Says the one who does it all the time. How do you know it doesn't physically pain my facial muscles from how unused they are to forming that expression?

[withoutasign]

[You mean these muscles that Signless is dangling over right now, and that he starts patting with his ratty little paws? Those muscles?]

You just need more pracice. You have to strengthen the muscles in your face just like the muscles anywhere else.

[bethehugejerk]

[Karkat frowns with a stubborn devotion to the task. He won't let you make him, Signless! Nope.]

Who says I want to practice?

[withoutasign]

[Your mousedad is very determined, Karkat. He lets go of the hair he's holding onto and lands on Karkat's nose with a plop.]

Well, you enjoy practicing frowning so much, I thought you might like a new challenge.

[bethehugejerk]

I don't practice.

[He reaches up no, going to take the Signless from his nose, because seriously dad what are you even doing. That's not a good place to sit.]

When I came into the universe, fresh from the paradox slime of my ectobiological cloning, it was with a frown on my face. I was there to see my wriggly little grub self; trust me on this.

[He's bullshitting.]

Frowning is my natural state of being and I am not about to stop being me for the sake of a little facial acrobatics.

[withoutasign]

Uh huh.

[Signless lets Karkat take him off his nose, and curls up in the palm of his hand, which is a much more comfortable spot than his nose anyway.]

Maybe you were holding the grub upside down. And hey! If you were frowning, does that mean I was smiling?

[bethehugejerk]

I had to handle twenty-four of the slimy little asswidgets; I know better than anyone save the Dolorosa herself how to hold a grub right side up. And yes, you were, you smiley little freak.

[withoutasign]

[That just makes him grin more.]

Are you sure, then, that you sent me back in time and not yourself? Maybe you got the grubs mixed up and are secretly a smiling machine, just waiting to be loosed upon the world!

[bethehugejerk]

Who's the ectobiologist here, Dad?

[Pointed frown!]

For your information, we were both sent back in time, and that process was automated, coinciding with the start of the Reckoning. Once it began, all the grubs disappeared to their respective meteors in the Veil, then as they flew towards the battlefield, Skaia's defense portals caught them and sent them back to the appropriate parts of Alternia's timeline. If, somehow, our grubs had been mixed up and sent to the wrong points, every one of us would be dead now.

[withoutasign]

All right, all right, point taken.

You know, I've never actually seen a grub. What are they like?