it's halloween, lo-ween, everybody!

[sos_pilot]

Who: Everyone's Invited!
Where: Various decorated carriages!
When: Horseshoe 31.
What: Della is hosting a Halloween party! Come for treats, tricks, and trouble!
Warnings: N/A, will update it needed.

The room is dark…why aren’t the lights on? But as the doors fully open, a voice begins laughing darkly…

… although if you’ve ever heard the voice of Della Duck, you’ll recognize her immediately.

“Boys and girls of every age, wouldn’t you like to see something strange?”

Suddenly there’s a big THUD as someone drops from the ceiling, the lights flash on, and Della herself, dressed as a zombie – ripped apart clothes, fake blood here and there, drawn on scars - wiggles her fingers before laughing joyfully. “Happy Halloween, everybody! Let’s party!”

Tasty Treats

A big buffet table of candy and punch has been laid out! Mini chocolate bars and multi-colored lollipops, gummy worms and candy corn, all sorts of sweet and sour shenanigans, ghost-shaped cookies and mummy-looking muffins! There’s plenty to eat, with absolutely no healthy alternatives.

There are also small wrapped bags of candy with the letters “T.o.T” written on them. If someone tells you, “Trick or Treat!” you have to share your candy! Or keep it to yourself, you monster.

Haunted House

Thanks to Seto Kaiba’s projections, a neighboring carriage has been converted into a Haunted House! While it’s all a trick on the eyes, it gives the illusion that there are several floors of spookiness. Each floor has a different theme –

#1 Serial Seriousness – Every so often, a masked intruder pops out at you, with long claws or chainsaw, ready to give chase! Be careful, or you’ll be the next victim!

#2 Zombie Zaniness – Moans and groans of the undead can’t be unheard. Rotting arms will try to swipe at you through the floorboards!

#3 Ghostly Games – You can see through them, and they can see you too! Each mirror reflects a different dastardly demon!

#4 Deadly Doctors – In this hospital, it’s not the awful health insurance that’ll kill you! Beware the bloody nurses and their extra big needles!\

#5 Fishy Fears - … Wait, what? … Okay, this last floor was clearly designed by Della. It’s like Under the Sea, but with sharks and octopi and kraken - and Della insists this is the worst floor.

Feel free to have your characters braving the house, or trying to scare people within!

Dance Floor

If being haunted isn’t your thing, nothing wrong with getting your groove on! Ask DJ Della what kind of song you’d like to play, and she’s happy to put on the list, from a classic Monster Mash to something more somber and soulful for you slow-dancing-romantic-vampire-types.

Turnip Carving
… Look, they didn’t have pumpkins. Anyway, you’re encouraged to carve scary and silly faces in these veggies! There is a contest, but everyone will be a winner, from “Most Realistic” to “Most Depressing” !

Movie Mania
Kick back and relax – and be horrified – at the otherworldly horror films! Like the horrific monster mime, “That”, the relentless umpire-mask wearing killer, “Monday the 20th”, and the endless array of the undead, “Midmorning Of The Not Wholly Alive”!

Some of you awful people might be thinking of popping up and scaring the theater-goers and this is /winkwinknudgenudge/ totally not approved. /plausible deniability/

Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark
In one secluded, quiet, and verrry dark carriage, lit only by candles, here you are encouraged to tell the scariest stories you can think of! What eerie legends will you share from your world, or do you dare to make it up as you go along?

Make your own top-level, and happy haunting!

Also, if your character would like to dress up, costumes are available for this night only!

Comments

[fun_thementalist]

"I'm sure you will, I'm excited to see what you'll learn."

Gen thought for a moment, remembering what he was doing at about that age. Cards were a bit large for her to back-palm, they wouldn't be completely hidden behind her hands. Did they have coins? Coins were ridiculously simple for a beginner, he thought.

He'd need to investigate the art carriage more, maybe. Asking people for largely defunct money would probably become suspicious. But then, he thought of something, and he pulled out a dried blossom with a cheerful grin from his sleeve - sorry, from mid-air.

"Ta-da! I think we'll start by showing you how to make this disappear. You see how it can fit in the palm of your hand?" He handed the flower to her.

[knifewithnoname]

She watches him quietly, wondering what he might teach her, she grinned to see the dried flower appear.

She took it from him and nodded, placing it in the centre of her palm, it was indeed small enough to fit.

"Yes I can be seeing how."

[fun_thementalist]

"Okay, my dear, so, look at me with this playing card," Gen invited.

It also fit in the palm of his hand. In a flick, he made it 'disappear'.

Then, Gen winked, and pulled down his sleeve, so the girl could see where it was. "This is what I'm going to teach you how to do. I'll do it more slowly this time, so you can see how it's done."

He's never taught anyone before, but he remembered the videos on the internet, the books he used to read, when he was teaching himself, at a younger age than this girl. He did his best to move slowly and carefully so she could watch him.

[knifewithnoname]

She nodded, watching the card carefully as it disappeared and he pulled it out of his sleeve. She grinned and leaned forward to watch as he did it even slower.

She was pretty fast with her hands, you had to be to nab things from Gauigen markets, or those shopping there, without getting caught. But a lot of what she knows relies on people not noticing her until it's too late. Knowing how to make something vanish when people's eyes are on her... That would be useful.

She copied him, her face one of concentration. It was a little clumsy but she got the coin into her sleeve. She retrieved it and tried again, determined to make it look smooth.

[fun_thementalist]

"You've got a natural talent!" Gen praised her, not lying, recognizing those quick hands. Maybe she had to swipe a few things out of mischief, or out of survival, in the past. He was certainly the last to judge a kid for something like that. "Now, if you're ever doing this, and you're not sure you've practiced well enough - that's when you distract them."

He winked. "And misdirecting always helps even when you are good. If you're doing a bit of trickery - if you can - get them to look somewhere you want them to, instead of where you're trying to hide something."

[knifewithnoname]

"So even quick eyes can no be seeing you."

She nodded with a grin and then practised the trick again, moving the coin from her hand into her sleeve.

"But you do be needing to be making sure they do no be getting suspicious..."

So the distraction had to be natural. Some people were very nosy.

[fun_thementalist]

"Exactly!" Gen grinned, and encouraged, "You're getting a lot better, my dear, you'll want to practice this a lot, when you're alone. You won't want an audience until you're ready for your performance, of course."

"So, distractions. It depends on what they think you are, of course. You're an innocent-looking little girl - if you do something cute, like giggle or blush, maybe sticking your tongue out - people will be watching your face instead of what your hands are doing. Me, people think I'm very silly, so if I keep being a silly sort of person, they don't think what I'm distracting them with is very strange. You see?"

[knifewithnoname]

She was very glad to hear him call her innocent-looking. It was a relief, that even if sometimes she felt like everything on this train made her seen, not hidden, unable to hide even, that she wasn't too obvious.

"So you do be being silly all the time, so they do no even be noticing?"

She's not sure she could be cute all the time, it would be very exhausting.

[fun_thementalist]

"Sometimes it doesn't require silly," Gen told her with a little wink. "Sometimes ... I have to be devious-looking."

He bowed, and then put on a scary sort of smile. "Sometimes, people can be distracted by thinking I'm a little crazy, or that I'm more dangerous than I really am."

Gen's expression was bright and charming a moment after. "Especially if I'm doing a magic trick for someone very tough and macho! They don't want to feel like they've fallen for something dumb and silly."

[knifewithnoname]

"So you do be needing to be knowing what they do be being like before you can be doing it."

That was something she was familiar with, she found the more she knew someone the easier it was to talk to them, she knew what they liked and how to keep the conversations on that, to keep it away from anything they might ask about her.

If she could do it with words she could do it with actions and tricks. "People do no be being liking to be being stupid, so you do be needing to be making them be believing they do be being smart and strong, which means to be tricking them they do be having to be believing you even more smart."

Maybe, it's a hard concept, but she thinks she understands it.

[fun_thementalist]

"That helps! You can tell a lot from how people talk, or dress. Sometimes you need to feel them out a little before you start your performance. Small talk really can help, or making little jokes. But you should do what's most comfortable for you, my dear."

Gen gave her an encouraging smile. "Very very right. People don't like to feel stupid, or laughed at. You certainly don't want to make people feel humiliated by your magic. When they realize they've been tricked - hopefully they'll laugh at the performance, or feel impressed, or awed. The less obvious your trick is, the more impressed they should be."

His smile warm and gentle, he said, "Let me see you back-palm that flower again. Then, I'll show you how to do this -"

Though his hands looked empty, he reached forward and appeared to pull the Ace of Spades out from behind the girl's ear.

[knifewithnoname]

So it was very much like spying, learn your target... audience. Before doing the trick and then it easy to know how to distract them, how to make them believe.

She grinned when he pulled the card from behind her ear, she definitely wanted to learn that. Disappearing things was one thing, and pretty impressive, but making them appear elsewhere was even better.

She put the flower in her hand again and grinned at him before palming it, trying not to look at her hands herself, to not bring any more attention to what she was doing.

[fun_thementalist]

Perhaps that's another reason why Gen kept his secrets so close to his chest, how he understood magic and performing. Otherwise, more people would catch on that a good magician was very much like a good spy - and they might realize, that's exactly what Gen did, on behalf of the Kingdom of Science.

Gen smiled warmly. "You're doing very well, my dear. Okay, so, to do the trick I'd done, once the object is 'disappeared' -"

He back-palmed the playing card for her -

"- you'll then make it 'reappear' wherever you'd like. Behind the ear is a classic." Gen then revealed the card in a flourish.

"But you can also pretend to pull something out of someone's breast-pocket, or form inside their jacket ..." Gen repeated it all a second time, much more slowly, the 'disappear' and the 'reappear'. "If it's behind their ear, though, they can't really quite see what you're doing, so it's easier."

[knifewithnoname]

So it was as easy as bringing it out again, but somewhere else. Without them knowing you still had it. She watched carefully as his hands moved and copied the movement herself, a little clumsily. Reappearing things was not something she was used to doing. Usually if she had hidden something she needed it to stay hidden.

She practised another time, disappear, reappear. Disappear.

She leaned forward to reach behind his ear and brought the flower out without dropping it.

[fun_thementalist]

"Brava! Brava!" Gen beamed and clapped. "Well done, well done. I'm very impressed with you."

He winked at her. "Of course, you'll want to keep practicing this one before I show you more complicated tricks ... but before long, you might learn enough to put on a little magic performance of your own, don't you think? Let's say ... in a little while, I teach you another? Regular magic lessons for a talented apprentice."

[knifewithnoname]

She beamed at that, "I would be liking that, I will be working really hard and I will be learning everythng."

She was good at learning and so far he was a good teacher. She would master this trick and then he would teach her more complicated things.

Everything was worth learning after all, and she could see how this fake magic would be useful for more than just performances.

[fun_thementalist]

"I'm sure you will, my dear. You've already worked very hard," Gen praised.

Of course, she might not realize how little he'd judge her for wanting to use the skills of slight of hand for more than just magic tricks. Some people simply needed to do what they had to to survive. Sometimes, that just meant theft.

"My name is Gen Asagiri," Gen finally exchanged his name. "Feel free to find me if you'd like a chat, and I'll find you when it's time for another lesson."

[knifewithnoname]

"I do be thanking you, Gen Asagiri." She disappeared her flower again and reappeared it from behind his ear with another grin.

"You can be calling me Buttercup, or B if you do be wanting to be doing."

[fun_thementalist]

"You're very welcome! You can just call me Gen, if you like," Gen told her, and gave a delighted little laugh when she performed the trick again.

Warmly, he told her, "Buttercup or B. A busy little Bee, adorable and clever. And clearly a hard worker, too!"

[knifewithnoname]

She beamed at the praise, she was a hard worker. That was true. "Okay I will be calling you Gen then."

It was easier at least.

[fun_thementalist]

“I will look forward to teaching you more, Buttercup,” Gen told her warmly. “I hope you have fun with the party here.”

[knifewithnoname]

"I will be doing." She nodded, "You should be having fun too."

She grins at him again and skips off into the crowd, to see what else there is.