introductory mingle: FLOWER FESTIVAL

[riverviewmod]

who: everyone in Riverview!
what: Introductory Log and Flower Festival Celebration
when: April 2nd - April 15th
where: In several different locations in the downtown area of the Inhabited City.
warnings: please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines

flower festival

In the days leading up to April 2nd, residents new and old may notice advertising around the city, everywhere from digital screens to paper flyers pasted on blank walls, all advertising an upcoming holiday: The Flower Festival. Celebrating springtime, beauty, joy, and togetherness, the festival heavily features floral themes and dancing. The advertising mentions that on April 10th, a paid holiday, there will be a Blossom Picnic, as well as lists of various public dances at clubs or other open venues, and adult raves.

a celebration of spring

The Flower Festival's main event is the Blossom Picnic on April 10th, but it also features traditions of sharing food and drink, and dancing that span over the course of the whole two weeks. There are a large variety of events going on throughout the city, from dancing lessons in any wide variety of traditional dances, to old-fashioned sock hops, to adult raves complete with mild party drugs. Feel free to use the prompts below or create your own event at any point during the festival, and if your character creates an event and hosts it in a top-level, you can submit that thread for extra bonus points.

i. blossom picnic

The main event that kicks off the second week of the Flower Festival is the Blossom Picnic on April 10th. A relaxed and low-key event, it draws several thousand people every year to the spacious Riverview Central Park, where there is a generous lawn lined with various blossoming trees, and families, found families, lovers, and groups of friends are encouraged to lay out a picnic blanket and share food. There will be live bands playing (but not loudly enough to distract from conversation and peacefully watching the petals flutter in the wind), a variety of demonstrations of traditional cultural dances from many different realities and planets, and a ton of ice cream vendors. This is an excellent festival not only for celebrating togetherness with the people who are already important, but for mingling and making new friends.

Characters may either pack their own lunches or they can purchase pre-packed Blossom Festival lunches. Stores and street markets are carrying a wide variety of specialty food that is only available at this time of year - predominantly pastries, an assortment of types of candies, and ice cream treats all in various floral flavors, as well as a sort of ambrosia salad based around a sweet rose-flavored cream and a native fruit that is bright green and tastes like a combination of peach and citrus.

ii. dancing lessons

Starting on April 2nd, there will be dancing lessons offered almost everywhere you look! From partner dances to group dances to line dances; sexy and sensual or innocent and childlike - almost any type of dance you can imagine is represented, from any reality or planet that has people in Riverview Quarantine.

Additionally, the Riverview Central Community Center has multiple rooms blocked off so anyone who knows a dance from home can teach it to others in their community - sharing is caring, after all. Characters are welcome to block off one of these rooms and offer lessons in any dance they happen to know from home (and these sorts of thread starters would be eligible for the mingle AC Point bonus)!

iii. flower festival dancing

This is pretty simply what it says on the tin - in almost every club, community center, or other public space, there will be dancing at almost all hours of the day or night, formal and informal. Musicians bring out their instruments and play in the street for demonstrations of cultural dances and music at the same time as clubs are offering VIP cover charges for exclusive dances, and you can find anything in between.

There are also many low-cover-charge raves that allow under-18s so younger characters can stay up all night and dance like crazy. The legal drinking age in Riverview Quarantine is 14, and so anyone over 14 can enter and indulge in a few drinks, dancing, and playing tag with a non-intoxicating version of the colored powder featured at the adult raves. There is copious amounts of security on site to ensure that everyone is safe, as well as nurses and off-duty police officers to offer advice or care for anyone who overindulges out of lack of experience.

Grab a partner, a group of friends, or just cruise and mingle the various dancing events.

Characters may also notice that most of the street markets and clothing shops are offering clothing that features floral patterns, flowers as accessories, and that show a lot of skin - for men, women, and anyone in between!

iv. adult raves

Advertised on flyers and digital screens around the city, made to pop as if they were under blacklight, is a series of adult raves that are happening in various large empty warehouse spaces around the city, including one that is listed as the danger rave and hosted in an abandoned factory outside the inhabited city walls. With bouncers at the door to ensure that anyone entering is 18+, the raves are comfortably adult in nature. Clothing is optional, showing skin is encouraged, and there are a lot of neatly tucked away spaces for attendees to get some time alone with one or more than one person, as well as spaces intended for orgies. The atmosphere is sex-positive and non-judgemental, open to any orientation or preference, with various forms of protection available for free, however, to ensure that everyone plays safe there are sober security teams out en masse at all premises to oversee the events.

(CW: DRUG USE) In each location, there is one specific room where attendees can enter, and dance or play tag with brightly colored powder that contains small amounts of a legal party drug commonly available in Riverview, which is absorbed through the skin. Not much more intoxicating than having a few beers, the effects of the drug are a pleasant low-key buzzing euphoria, positive sensitivity to touch, a heightening of desires for intimacy, and a mild lowering of inhibitions. Once a character has been hit with the powder, the color lingers on the skin so other attendees can know who has partaken, but once the powder makes contact with a surface it deactivates, meaning that partakers can safely dance with non-partakers without sharing the intoxicating effects.

Please be sure to warn in subject lines for any threads involving drug use. And remember, there is always security to intervene and make sure everyone is safe.

v. roommates or wildcard

Feel free to use this prompt to set up headers for a communal floor, or threads open to roommates for the purpose of getting to know each other. Or if you have an idea for a prompt that isn't in this list, set at the Flower Festival, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view

Credit: third image by Steve Goad; other images found on uncredited on Pinterest or Google images - please let the mod know if you find credit!

navigation

Comments

[wingedman]

[ At some point in this chaos, Sam ends up dancing near Loki, although he's not sure if dancing is the right word for something so primal it resonates in his bones, for a movement that seems to turn the entire crowd into a single giant pulsating organism with a single mind (and that mind is, of course, Loki). Not drugged, the magic doesn't grip him the same way it does everyone else, the compulsion is less (but still there). His gaze lingers on the gold-splashed bare skin, and he smiles.]

Giving Bowie a run for his money, are you?

[ikols]

The magic danced long before he picked up his first eyeliner, Sam.

[ Side-stepping around Sam to the beat, he shrugs through a twist and leans in with eyes that glow in the half-light, gold-dust on his body detailing where he is as the rest falls into the shadows.

Loki's laughter causes an uprising of the same in the surrounding throng. ]

It danced for me.

[wingedman]

Ooh, is that supposed to sound ominous or seductive? Or both?

[Sam grins, and the curve of his lips holds a promise, or the potential of one. An appreciation for what's in front of him, at least, and one that's hard to miss.]

And you didn't even have to steal any babies, either.

[ikols]

I'd use them as ammunition against you.

[ De-cloaking somewhat as he steps into a more visible state, he draws a line down Sam's chest with a gold-spattered finger and leans in. ]

Don't you have enough Avenge-hyped partners to shimmy upon tonight? Everyone in bed by nine?

[wingedman]

Literal baby-throwing or emotional ammunition?

[And as Loki closes the distance between them, so does Sam, dark eyes following the line of his finger before traveling back up to his face.]

More like they're afraid of breaking a hip out here. But you're not wrong, either.

[His teeth are a flash of white in the darkness, and he leans in to whisper in Loki's ear.]

Take the magic off me, and I'll dance with you.

[ikols]

[ Here in the epicentre of his thrall, given every advantage, Loki shakes his head and steps back with hands spread wide. ]

Let it remain and trust me.

[wingedman]

Trust that you aren't taking my consent away?

[Sam arches an eyebrow. This is pretty much the epitome of bad life choices that he'll regret in the morning. And while Sam knows that you shouldn't trust a trickster, the fact remains that he's the one who's been kind of a dick in all their interactions thus far.

So he steps in again, settles his hands on Loki's hips.

Bad life choices 1, Sam 0.]

[ikols]

[ Bad Life Choices are on a winning streak lately where their multiverse is concerned. He slides his hands up Sam's chest, tilting a look at him as he begins to sway. It's a squint somewhere between Scared, Potter? and Cash me ousside how bow dah. ]

Just because a fella happens to have a spell that could turn your eyeballs inside-out isn't to say he's going to use it, you know.

[wingedman]

[ You wish, Loki. You wish. ]

A, that would really ruin my night, and B, then I'd have to be Batman or something, and I sure as hell can't echolocate. But that's where the whole trust thing comes in.

[ Sam's a tactile sort of person, and simply touching him is always one of the easiest ways of winning him over. His eyes slide shut for a moment, like a cat being petted, and even as he keeps dancing, he leans into Loki's touch. Who needs magic when there are far simpler tactics? ]

[ikols]

See, that's what I said. Exactly my point.

[ Hips align and lock as Loki adheres himself to Sam, cinching his arms around his neck to bring them closer. The curves of his horns rest coolly against Sam's forehead, keeping a few inches between their lips as the godling regards him. ]

You're not this loose on Earth-616.

[wingedman]

Weren't you the one who said that you shouldn't judge people by their counterparts?

[ Sam can't say anything about his alternate self - doesn't know anything about him, really. And, to be fair, Sam himself might not normally be this loose, but...well, he'd been under a lot of stress at home. He might be overcompensating just a little bit.

Fingers reach up and trace cool gold, warmed just slightly from contact with his skin, slide along the curves of the horns and skim the edges of the crown until they slip to Loki's cheekbone - a curve just as defined as the wrought metal, but a little more pliant. ]

I'd say you're not this tall, but- you're the first Loki I've met in person.

[ikols]

It's an observation. [ Not a critique, he amends that in tone.

Loki reacts to the caress over his horns like he would if they were attached, lashes fluttering as he tilts them into Sam's touch until a palm finds a home on his cheek. That was nice. ]

Hopefully the last.

[wingedman]

[And Sam wants more information on the other Lokis - on this Loki - but this is neither the time nor the place, and Loki almost certainly isn't the person to ask about that anyway. Sam's noticed he's a little testy about that.]

Maybe I'm the fun Sam.

[Maybe he's making dumbass decisions like he's fifteen years younger than he really is, the Sam who hadn't gone to war and seen his best friend shot down in front of him, the Sam who hadn't spent long months putting his life back together, building a brand new one from the wreckage of the old.

He's not the fun Sam, he's just trying to pretend he isn't haunted by ghosts for once in his damn life. And if forgetting means throwing himself into hedonism for a few days, then he'll pay the price for that later.]

Better than hanging out with pigeons, at any rate.

[ikols]

Redwing? Mm, birds make for odd companions.

[ That must be to whom Sam is referencing as he and Loki slowly move together under the club-lights. Hardly dancing anymore, merely staying connected. ]

Do you think you're the fun Sam, Sam?

[wingedman]

And the rest of his bird pals.

[Not that Sam's secretly jealous - okay, he's secretly jealous. It's hard being the one without any powers sometimes.]

I think I'm probably too old and responsible to be the fun Sam.

[But he catches Loki's lower lip between his teeth anyway, tugs it gently before pressing a soft kiss against his mouth.]

[ikols]

[ Too distracted rolling over Sam's insecurities, Loki's eyes widen and a surprised sound leaves him when his lip is taken prisoner, blinking rapidly. He reasserts his grip on Sam to hold his upper arms, then relaxes as a gentle kiss seals off any danger.

Seduction having lapsed for a while there, his first instinct was, embarrassingly, alarm. ]