introductory mingle: carnivale

[riverviewmod]

who: everyone in Riverview!
what: Introductory Log and Carnivale Celebration
when: July 1st - July 9th
where: Anywhere around the city.
warnings: please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines

carnivale

In the days leading up to July 1st, residents new and old will notice preparations beginning, a flurry of activity getting the city ready for the upcoming celebration: Carnivale. This holiday is in celebration of music, and the onset of summer and warmer weather. The celebrations are marked by street parties, an extensive program of live musical performances, with a large parade (and paid holiday!) capping it off on July 8th.

celebrating music, and summer

After a couple of months of low-key or even solemn celebrations, it's time for Riverview Quarantine to throw a good, old-fashioned party. Carnivale is a city-wide festival that pretty much everyone gets into, and many residents take the entire week off so they can enjoy all the festivities. With events ranging from impromptu street parties, free live musical performances, food stands, themed club nights, adult lounges with kink shows, and topped off with a massive party parade, the holiday has a lot to offer for anyone who likes to sing, dance, and show some skin!

i. street parties and food

One of the staples of the Carnivale festival is the spontaneous street parties and food trucks and carts. It's not unusual during the holiday to turn a corner and run into a group of people dressed in bright colors and sequins having an impromptu party with a few drinks, and then be invited to join right in! Carnivale is a celebration of music as well as summer, so most shops and stalls will be blasting danceable music into the streets to facilitate these little street parties - it's considered a sign of good luck for the owner of a business if an impromptu Carnivale celebration starts up in front of their door.

Considering the proliferation of street parties and people out and about to celebrate the warmer weather, local business owners also take to the streets. Food carts, stands, and trucks pop up on almost every street corner offering a wide variety of food from savory treats to sweet desserts. Many of the carts are offering one free item to anyone dressed up for Carnivale - anything shimmery, shiny, or brightly colored will do!

ii. live musical performances

One of the major roads in the city center has been completely roped off for the entire week, and all along this street, various temporary stages have been set up, each with a nice hefty sound system. Volunteers hand out printed flyers, and digital boards are set up here and there with schedules of various performances that are all free to attend, ranging from well-known popular music artists to new up-and-comers or independent artists who are looking to make a name for themselves. This event is very widely advertised around the city, and is accepting entries until the very last minute.

At couple of the acts might be familiar faces to some of the residents.

Eichi Tenshouin has signed up himself and his friend Tsumugi Aoba into the music festival as a first-time appearing idol unit called "Higanbana." Dressed in all white with splashes of color (blue, largely, with only their headsets being a red spider lily), they carry a very commanding and angelic image together. They'll have a routine that emphasizes their great harmony with each other, taking turns doing solo lines and joining together to show off each of their talents. Singing and dancing, they interact heavily with the audience and will encourage a lot of involvement with speaking between songs and gestures, winks, and so on. Basically, they intend to make this Riverview's very first prominent "idol performance".

For his performance, Otabek Altin will start with rock remixes of a few popular pop songs. He wants to make sure that it starts off with recognizable pieces for some people, and he certainly thinks it is something that could get people excited even if they don't know it. Then, it shifts into a few original songs. They are upbeat, rock songs that he put together with the intention to make people dance and move, since he is a DJ. He'll end his set with a slower piece he put together that is also an original. Through the entire performance, he's focused and quiet, though he may occasionally try and excite the crowd with a few words.

Any other player-characters who are musically inclined are more than welcome to assume their character was fit in for a performance, and can post up a top-level with a rundown of their performance to get bonus Activity Points for posting a mingle!

iii. carnivale parade

The other main attraction of Carnivale week comes on July 8th, which is a paid holiday for everyone in the city. The Carnivale Parade will be starting out by City Hall and winding through downtown in a lazy pattern so everyone in the city has a chance to see it. There will be all sorts of floats, dancers, marching bands, with all sorts of clubs, businesses, and other organizations represented. The theme is theatrical, big and showy, bright and colorful, sparkly and shiny, with loud music and lots of glitz and glamour. Observers can expect great music, excellent dancing and marching shows, neat vehicles provided by classic car clubs, the fire, police, and Perimeter Guard. They can also expect a lot of party favors, whether it's a sparkly plastic beaded necklace, a fan to take the edge off the heat, candy, popsicles, a temporary tattoo, or any number of other little treats or toys to be tossed into the crowd - some of them fit for kids and teens, others of a more 'adult' nature handed out a bit more discreetly to anyone who looks the part.

And make sure you wear your waterproof mascara - Carnivale floats have a tendency of spraying or spritzing water, both in an unspoken competition to see who can make the biggest water-refraction rainbow in the air, and to keep observers cool in the new summer heat.

iv. adult: lounges and kink exhibition

Thanks to the Carnivale tradition of showing as much skin as possible, some event organizers' minds have turned to topics of a more adult nature. In the evenings, residents may see clubs doing "lounge nights"; these adults-only events have bouncers IDing everyone at the door to ensure they're 18+. The themes may vary, from very specific niche themes like 'golden age superheroes' to broad themes like 'rainbows,' and each event is clearly marked as what it is - all-nude or clothing-optional, and can host events ranging from amateur to professional exotic dancing, food served off of nude bodies, anonymous masked hookups, or just provide a comfortable space where casual sex is encouraged with whoever happens to be around. Various legal substances can be found at these lounges, but nothing that would cause violation of consent, and every substance would be clearly labeled and have warnings to ensure that no one partakes unless they choose to. Please be sure to warn in the subject line for sexual content or drug use (since some mild party drugs are legal in Riverview).

For the weekend from July 7th-9th, there will be a kink exhibition in one of the large exhibition centers downtown, limited to characters 18+. The exhibition is a sexy adult informational convention featuring various kinks and fetishes. Whether you're into leather, latex, lace, or anything else, you'll be able to find the clothes, toys, guides, books, erotica, fiction, and a wide variety of other interesting stuff to explore. While the atmosphere is sex-positive and there are private and public (for the voyeurs and exhibitionists in the room) venues for having sex, it's definitely focused on exploration and information about different stuff to try.

v. roommates or wildcard

Feel free to use this prompt to meet new roommates, for the purpose of getting to know each other, or hit up one of the mod-posted prompts for each Communal Floor. Or if you have an idea for a prompt that isn't in this list, set during Carnivale, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view

Credit: image i: Roger Patterson Jr.; image ii: Syd Mead; image iii: screencap from the movie Paprika; image iv: siamon89

navigation

Comments

[franciscoramon]

[ When Eddie says I'm sure you've noticed that much, Cisco has a moment of sheer panicked certainty that Taako had told Eddie about his stupid answer from that stupid truth or dare game. He just has to be doing this on purpose. Cisco's cheeks burn, with shame now more than anything else. They'd probably laughed about it, the both of them. And he couldn't even blame them.

His better sense battles his paranoia; they're both good people, and he knows it. Eddie's comments only seem pointed to him because he feels guilty and embarrassed at himself. Swallowing, Cisco turns a little bit away from Eddie and says: ]

Hey, last time I checked there's no rules against body hair in crossdressing, man. It can look just as good, if the person's working it.

[ Eddie coughing snaps Cisco out of his funk, but he completely misinterprets the cause of it. Seeing Eddie red in the face and looking sunny and embarrassed and harmless loosens the knot of unease in Cisco's stomach. ]

I didn't mean, like, Caitlin or Iris or whoever are getting off on going to work in heels 'cause it's painful or whatever, I'm pretty sure it's also just a fashion thing.

[ He sets down the heels he'd been holding onto, moving to the next booth over, one that boasts a variety of different bottles. At first, Cisco thinks it's relatively run-of-the-mill: massage oils, lubricants, that sort of thing. Useful for a variety of kinks and vanilla sex, but nothing terribly interesting. If Eddie weren't there, he might even think of buying himself something.

But there's another part of the display that draws his eye - tiny bottles that are kept beneath a glass case, each with a descriptive label beside it. Cisco comes closer, peering down to read what they say. ]

Oh, weird, these are like... magic potions, I guess.

[causational]

[It doesn't even occur to Eddie that Cisco might pick up some other meaning in what he said - it seems obvious to him that he meant the fact he's wearing a mesh shirt and just changed tops in front of Cisco makes the hair on his chest pretty apparent. In fact, he's mostly surprised by the fact that Cisco explains that body hair can look good while crossdressing, and he laughs, abruptly.]

What? Really? No way. I can't imagine trying to pull off one of those silky lacy things with a chest like a bale of hay.

[Eddie's mouth curves up a little, his face still red, and the self-deprecation is distracting him from the inappropriate thoughts he'd had a bit earlier. Okay. Maybe is still having, because he can't help but make some kind of connection between Cisco's assertion that body hair can work with crossdressing and the comment about heels earlier and...god, he really needs to get his brain out of the gutter.

Thankfully, the mention of Iris and heels being just for fashion washes some of that away, with the little spike of pain that still accompanies any mention of her. It's getting better, but it's still there, just a bit, just enough that he can focus again. They're moving on from the heels and he goes willingly, browsing through some of the bottles of lubes and oils and that kind of thing, curiously picking up one or another.

When Cisco mentions magic potions, though, he blinks and immediately leans over to peer at them curiously.]

Whoa. Taako told me he definitely doesn't have an orgasm spell, so I thought there wasn't much in the way of sex magic. I wonder what they do.

[Lifting his head, he makes eye contact with the vendor.]

Excuse me. Can I ask what these do?

[franciscoramon]

[ Cisco just shrugs; he might be more articulate about the whole thing if he weren't trying hard not to think about Eddie's chest or bales of hay or silky lacy things or any combination thereof. Maybe some other time, when he's less flustered, he'll make a better defense about ambiguity and genderbending and the whole thing. For now he merely says: ]

I can.

[ He snorts a little laugh; of course Eddie had asked Taako if there was an orgasm spell. It's what Cisco would've done, if he were going steady with a wizard. But it also makes sense to him that a potion is not quite the same thing as a spell, and that there are types of magic here that might not be the same as the magic Taako's learned. There are so many different worlds represented on this moon - some of them must have relatively innocuous forms of magic.

Cisco is glad that Eddie asks for the explanation, since it means he doesn't have to. Together, the two of them listen as the older, bearded man behind the booth explains the potions. One, he says, will alter the physical sex of the person who takes it, for a few hours. He says there are varieties of the potion - some that make only minor changes, others that are more of a full-body alteration. Another whole section of potions are, apparently, for sensory deprivation, leaving the drinker blind, or deaf, or both, and more. Those ones, he says, require the purchaser to sign a waiver.

There are others, too. Potions to enhance certain emotions and sensations, potions to induce hypersensitvity, potions to do all kinds of things that Cisco doesn't even understand right away how they could possibly be sexual. It's all very impressive, and more than a little daunting. ]

Dude...

[causational]

[It isn't so much that Eddie has anything against it, he just doesn't have any point of context, doesn't know much at all about gender bending, only that he likes people in heels, likes people in silky lacy things. He's had the occasional thought about men in silky lacy things, but it was just never men like him, hairy and bulky, it was always slim men, like Taako, or men with curves like Cisco has...

Tearing his thoughts away from that forcibly, his face bright red, he leans over to look at the potions more closely, swallowing hard.]

Wow. They can do that? Wow.

[Licking his lips anxiously, Eddie glances over at Cisco, and then shrugs.]

I'm not gonna lie. I'm seriously tempted to try some of these. I mean, even if you didn't use them for sex, you know?

[But he can definitely think of dozens and dozens of ways to use these for sex, and if Cisco doesn't end up interested and he'd feel weird buying things right now, he makes a mental note of the booth to swing by later if need be.]

[franciscoramon]

[ Cisco glances over at Eddie at the same moment that Eddie's glancing at him. He doesn't say anything at first when Eddie says he's tempted to try some of them, hastily qualifying that it doesn't even have to be for sex. Once he's sure he's mastered his voice enough, Cisco says: ]

Yeah, man, go for it. I mean, yolo, right? Whole point of the expo is... trying stuff that's new... this is. Pretty much as new as it can get.

[ He swallows, feeling awkward, wanting to encourage Eddie as a friend but also trying very hard not to think too much about Eddie actually using any of these. That would be taking things way, way too far. That would be going beyond tiny secret crush he doesn't even want to acknowledge to himself and moving to take up residence in Straight-Up Creepsville.

(And Cisco, too, makes the resolution that he is going to come back here before the expo closes, without Eddie, and maybe pick up one or two of these, for himself...) ]