i saw lon cheney walking with the queen

[hellzone]

Who: open to all!
What: The Aqours Spooky Get Yohane Magical Powers Halloween Extravaganza...which is a super extra way of saying a Halloween party. It's a Halloween party, y'all.
When: early October
Where: a local restaurant in Olympia
Warning(s): none!

The Halloween party is in the back room of a local, family style restaurant. What used to be a banquet hall is decorated with fake cobwebs, crepe paper, and garlands of pumpkins, ghosts, and cats. A lot of the decorations are hand-made, courtesy of Yoshiko and You. There's an open space in the middle for dancing and mingling, some food tables along one side of the room, and some games and entertainment on the other side. There's a table with various hats, animal ears, and crowns for people who didn't bring a costume. Most of them are made out of cardboard. There's a very beat-up boombox in the corner, obviously borrowed from somebody, playing the El Nysa version of hokey Halloween songs like "The Monster Mash" and "Flying Purple People Eater."

The food is fairly standard Halloween fair. There's a large bowl full of candy, as well as some pumpkin flavored breads and muffins. There's a large punch bowl of something that's green, but is really your bog-standard lime sherbet/lemon-lime soda combination. The oddest thing on the table is some jet black takoyaki, labeled "Tears of a Fallen Angel." The label does not tell you that these things are spicy as hell and flavored solely with Tabasco. There's enough space on the table to fit more food, should your character decide to contribute something that isn't 'way too much sugar' or 'something that will melt your tongue off.'

The Halloween games are simple enough. There's a 'pin the tail on the donkey' though you're pinning a broomstick to a witch. There's a large tub for bobbing for apples. There's also a table dedicated to touch and feel mystery boxes: you reach in blindly to touch what's inside. The labels say things like 'eyeballs' (they're really peeled grapes), 'worms' (they're really cold, cooked spaghetti), and 'hearts' (it's a peeled tomato). The party's going past the closing time of the restaurant, so enjoy some slightly spooky nonsense!

( ooc: feel free to make a starter and tag around! Even if your character didn't reply to Yoshiko's post, it's possible that they heard about the party from somewhere else or just came in from the street: Yoshiko isn't turning away anybody. )

Comments

[hellzone]

Yoshiko isn't a life of a party sort of person. But she can recognize when a person is wallflowering it up. And that's Caleb right now: Caleb Widogast, professional wallflower. So of course she's gonna bother the hell out of him, giving Caleb a little smile as she does so.

Interesting though...that could be good interesting or bad interesting. Time to press for more information. "Are you from one of those worlds without Halloween?" Yoshiko asks. "I've had to explain the holiday to like five people already."

[breadmuffs]

"We have harvest festivals, and some holidays where you dress up in costume, but nothing quite like....this..."

Whatever this is. A holiday dedicated to being kind of scary? Caleb looks around the room again and then back at Yoshiko with a curious look. "What is the explanation? If you don't mind."

[hellzone]

She's already had to explain it to a few people, Yoshiko doesn't mind explaining it to Caleb. She shakes her head before she continues her explanation.

"Halloween is all about being scary. You watch scary movies, you dress up in scary costumes, you do scary things...it's a holiday about having fun, getting scared, pretending you're something you're not, and eating a whole bunch of candy."

Yoshiko has yet to explain what candy has to do with everything.

[breadmuffs]

Caleb isn't sure that he thinks this party is very scary, but he has enough social graces not to say that to the person who organized it. So he nods along to Yoshiko's description of it....up until the candy part, where he gives her an even more curious and confused look. Sweets as part of a festival does sort of fall in line with...some holidays? Feasts usually involve sweets. But candy isn't scary either.

"Where did the tradition come from? It is a little strange to have an entire celebration around...scary things...."

[hellzone]

"Originally, Halloween was a holiday where the barriers between the living and the dead vanish. Spirits cross the lands and people wear costumes to trick the spirits and appear friendly." Yoshiko's voice is dropping to a lower tone as she strikes a pose and tries to look very spooky.

"That's why there's trick or treat! The spirits would descend upon the realm and you had to appease them with candy, otherwise they'd mess things up for everybody."

This may or may not be bullshit.

[breadmuffs]

"Oh."

Actually, that's not that surprising. Well. Maybe the candy part, but even that...Caleb can see it. Offerings, people leave offerings for gods, why not offerings for spirits.

Yoshiko's pose is not very spooky, he's sorry. Or at least, Caleb looks more contemplative than he does freaked out.

"Ja, that makes sense. In Exandria, there are different planes of existence and beings can cross from one to the other. Not...spirits of the dead, but other things. The fae, celestial beings...things like that."

He's taking this too seriously...

[hellzone]

"Can they come over whenever? The spirits of the dead are just limited to Halloween in my world."

Yoshiko's taking Caleb too seriously as well. Obviously he's treating this with the right amount of respect, so she'll match this and treat the subject with the gravitas that this bullshit deserves.

[breadmuffs]

You'd think, knowing Molly, that Caleb would be able to Detect Bullshit. And he can, mostly. But it just doesn't seem that strange. (After all, the dead were just among them here. Caleb still isn't aware just how non-magical Yoshiko's world is.

"They cannot just appear wherever, there are places where the material plane intersects with other planes. But whenever...yes, as long as it's the right place. The Feywild, for example, is usually accessed through portals. Although there is also a spell that allows you to shift onto other planes. It isn't easy, of course."

Caleb, on the other hand, is not bullshitting at all.

[hellzone]

"So the spirits aren't constrained by dates...how interesting." Yoshiko puts her hand to her chin in thought, before striking a dramatic, over the top sort of pose.

"Tell me more about this Feywild, little demon!"

Because seriously, what's a Feywild.

[breadmuffs]

Little...what...? He's not a demon.... But on the other hand, he does remember Yoshiko talking about wanting to make Jester into one of...her demons...is that just how she addresses everyone?

It's very strange. Hm.

"Ah, the Feywild is one of the mirror planes to the Prime plane. The geography is much the same as our world...that is, the world I came from. But it is supposed to be much stranger and brighter. Magic is much stronger there and the inhabitants are just as strange as their surroundings. The most powerful there are the archfey, who are ancient beings. They're known to be fickle tricksters...though many fey creatures are that. The eladrin are the beings from whom elves are descended. Then there are the sidhe, the lords and ladies of the Summer and Winter Courts..."

Honestly, Caleb could probably just keep going....he's surprisingly confident when he's imparting knowledge like this.