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

[hellshot]

...

Of course you're a rich kid on top of being an idol. I already knew that, why the hell didn't I think as much before.

[It explains a bit of the others' nature, how he'd rush into things without thinking. And the appreciation for things like class and style.]

Tea is one thing. Dancing another. The latter will never happen again. [And he gestures a hand at the other, to direct him the hell off the mess of the dance floor that would, by all measures, last until sunrise.]

So long as you don't pitch over and have a heart attack, fine. I'm not a medic and I doubt anyone else here could deal with that. [Come on, there are some chairs over there...]

[finethanks]

So that's an acceptance to my invite for more tea. Fufu, I'm on floor 7 and room 4, so you can stop by whenever you'd like. ♪

[He decides not to comment on how likely it is he might have a heart attack, and just moves after the gesture to find some chairs, instead. He really just wants to have a good time, but he's been pushing himself since the moment he got here. The first day, being stuck in a hospital, had been frustrating, so the moment he was freed of course he'd be all over this hospital.

His body was still exhausted from switching universes again or whatever this was, he's sure, but was he supposed to just sit in his room alone? No way.

He takes a seat in one of the chairs, letting out a heavy sigh as a faintly trembling hand gestures to the chair beside him. Keep him company...]

Sorry, but I'll be fine in just a little while.

[hellshot]

...Honestly, I'd take any excuse to get out of my current living situation.

[He's far from saying he wants anything like more stupid tea parties in an atrium, but good god, he hates sharing space with people who weren't with him on the Eluvio.

He hated to even think it, but he missed Sombra. McCree and the two Shimada brothers were a cruel replacement.]

Yeah, take your time.

It's not like I have anywhere else to be.

[finethanks]

Is it that bad? [Enough that Reaper isn't even tsunning about tea parties... Goodness, he can only imagine.] A bad roommate, perhaps? Fufu, I happen to have no one else, currently, so you're welcome to stop by and have some tea whenever you need a break.

[hellshot]

Roommates.

Turns out, instead of ending up far from home with an ally, I've ended up here with some unsavory folk from back home.

[He's quiet for a moment, and then he waves his hand at Eichi.]

I don't want to discuss it.

[Conversation ended.]

[finethanks]

We don't have to discuss their relation to you, but I've dealt with enemies and rivals alike before, so I think there must be a solution.

[He has to pause to cough, but it's brief, and he's leaning back in his chair.] Depending on the type of people they are, you can leave surprises around the rooms for them so they get annoyed. The solution to irritating roommates may be to become the irritating roommate, I think. But that's just one path.

[hellshot]

...Ha. Any pranks I pull on those three would be viewed as attacks, and they'd likely all take up arms to defeat the monster.

[His head tips back and he lets out a low scoff.

Heroes, after all, are bound together by shit like 'taking out the bad guy', aren't they.]

[finethanks]

Is that how they view it? How close-minded. To point and call someone else a monster without recognizing the monsters in themselves is so hypocritical. I wonder what type of self-important roommates you must have.

[Eichi is such mean girl level sometimes. But he seems to be breathing better, only coughing quietly the next time.] But for me, there are those who I must sometimes become a "monster" towards. I would relentlessly battle with underhanded tactics until they were forced to forfeit. ♪

[Eichi, high school idol, talking about drama like it's war]

[hellshot]

[He finds himself snorting a bit of a laugh. Yeah, what kind of self-important roommates are they? One word escapes him, as if it's a perfect explanation:]

Overwatch.

[He raises a hand, waving it.]

For an idol, you talk big. Guessing your idea of battling is different than mine, by a long shot.

covers face with hands

[finethanks]

Fufu, I suppose that depends on how you think of it. It's true that I have a weak body and could never truly battle with guns or swords or anything in between, but through my words and actions I've successfully trampled everyone who was greater than me. I created distractions overseas, slowly gained power until funding was in my grasp and covered my hands in the blood of my fellow classmates just so that I could secure this seat on the throne.

[He's so extra, he's still talking about idol high school.] I lost friendships and crushed dreams all to achieve my own ephemeral dream. Using the corpses of my friends and enemies alike, I climbed this impossible tower and reached the top. Me, who has to try three times as hard as anyone else thanks to this weak body of mine. I had to use whatever dirty tricks that I could.

It's known as a war, and I'm known as Emperor, but in the end you're right to call it a longshot from anything like real battle.

eichi why are you like this

[hellshot]

....


[He's really not sure what to think of this. Half on the side of 'holy shit this child is far edgier than I imagined' and half on the side of 'this sounds far too much like politics'.]

Either you've got delusions of grandeur along with your heart problems, or you're in the wrong industry.

[You'd be a brilliant strategist if all of that is true.]

bc he was raised by weirdos probably

[finethanks]

[That earns a laugh. He'd actually be a very brilliant strategist, honestly... He actually did lead and win idol war to ridiculous levels that involved multiple countries and caused many other idols to have to change their lives to deal with it... This seems fine and normal to him.]

Do you think so? Well, I'm completely satisfied to keep climbing and climbing in this exact industry. I'll raise the importance of idols in everyone's eyes.

That being said, if you do grow tired of your predicament, you can always ask me for ideas.

well welcome too the weirdo family eichi

[hellshot]

My 'predicament'? I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

[There's absolutely nothing normal about Eichi's rant on Emperor kings and claiming a stage over the bodies of the dead, he's just...

You live in a world that's so different from his own, man.]

Way I see it, you're probably the only idol here. So you don't have much competition as it stands. Lucky you.

[finethanks]

Mm...

[Well thanks for reminding him he's alone, Reaper!! As much as he tries to keep a certain smiling image about him, his mood noticeably drops at that as he seems lost in thought.]

But that "competition" is what I lived for, you know. [He lets that sit barely for a second before he drops his hand away from his chin and glances up and over to Reaper again.] Anyway... I meant your rooming situation.

[Though he guesses he can't help with that either. He pauses for another few seconds. Now he's too lost in thoughts!!] I appreciate you keeping me company, but I think it's time I head back.

[hellshot]

[NO PROBLEM, MAN, Reaper thinks about he's alone every day of his life so it's great to not be alone here finally.

He gives the other a look-over, and if he were half the man he used to be, he'd offer the other some comforting quip about 'new people arriving all the time', or 'if Eichi creates a scene he'll create competition.'

Level 8 social link or higher needed.

But instead he raises a hand, and does his usual 'waving off' he does when he's done with a conversation.]

Don't get into any trouble on your way back.

[finethanks]

I'll be fine.

[That's his guarded response as he looks to Reaper for a moment, and then away again. Well, he could use the company, but when he's in this state, he doesn't want to be sitting here for hours without recovery and have that noticed. Besides, they're worlds apart, aren't they?

Now he's stuck thinking on that, and his friends left behind before he could get the chance to say goodbye. He only waits for a moment longer before pushing himself up and out of this chair and moving slowly back to his apartment on his own. This is absolutely why he gets into trouble, Reaper.]