interstellar5555 | ☆TRACK IIX: BETTER TO PRETEND PT. 1

Who: Famous musicians, hopeful auditioners, and random onlookers.
What: Hit gameshow series “Fairy Trial” is celebrating one of its anniversaries, and it’s invited you onboard. For more deets, check out the OOC post!
When: March 11th.
Where: Sevetop Entertainment’s studio.
Warnings: Mingle log mystery bag.

“It's so much better to pretend
There's something waiting for you here.
Every letter that you wrote
Has found its way to me, my dear.”

☆BETTER TO PRETEND

For musicians in either Pride or Virgo, the job offer is delivered by their managers- a suggestion to accept an invitation from Sevetop to participate in a successful gameshow. (A message that is delivered perhaps a bit more pressingly to some, with the unsaid words of “This is a chance to make it up to us”.) For others, strangers just trying to make a living and wait for their chance to save their loved ones, the message is delivered over their communicators by Gold, with promises that infiltrating this event will aid you in liberating the captives from their label's control. Either way, all roads lead to Sevetop Entertainment.

Sevetop might not have the weight that musical giants Pride Labels and Virgo Entertainment do, but that’s because it’s not into the musical industry. Sevetop is all about television and the big screen. For these purposes, it has its own little area of the city, a bustling kind of Hollywood filled with the more office-like buildings, auditoriums for additions, and even various sets. Whether you’re driven in style via limo, or brought to a regular line of buses, this is where you end up at.

Musicians, of course, end up at the more posh meeting room. A spread of delicate little lunch sandwiches, veggie platters, cupcakes, and assorted beverages are on a table for anyone to snatch up, and regularly refilled. Every celebrity is handed a small folder with papers inside going over both the boring legal things and explaining the purpose of the show. “Royals” are the ones to be “saved”, but they don’t have to make the journey easier on their “Heroes” and are given tools at their disposal to help or hinder. Heroes have one goal to accomplish, ‘rescuing’ their Royal, but it changes depending on the challenge.

Much to your surprise, some of those aspiring Heroes might just look familiar. Don't tell!

☆THE HEROES

In another building, next door, various people picked off the street (some coincidentally, others not so much, thanks to Gold's glamour witchcraft) are being given very much the same kind of presentation… In a room much more cramped, with not nearly enough chairs, on a slideshow. The only refreshments available are small bags of chips (try not to take more than one) and coolers full of bottled water.

After the separate presentations are done with, everyone is allowed to check out the sets for past seasons, which includes what look like giant mushroom tops that are made of very bouncy rubber, climbing walls made of fake vines, pumpkin shaped carriages (horses not included), and other such things.

Of course, it’s not all play. While you’re messing about, you’ve all been given numbers. Once you’ve been called, you’re to stand in front of Fairy Trial’s hosts and commentators: siblings Bella and Maurice Hooks. Both of them are equally friendly, although her more outgoing to his easygoing, but they have plenty of questions for this little audition. Tell them about yourself: hobbies, job, your favorite fairy tale, what you think your best skill is - and then, the most important, you get to display a choice "talent" in front of the audience. It can be whatever you like, as long as it's crowd appropriate.

Be careful, though, because the rock stars you're hoping to work with are watching, too. At the very least, don't make an ass out of yourself. Gold's enchantments are good, but there are some things that even magic can't charm its way through.

After all this, you’ll get a chance to just rest and mingle while your rides come back to take you back to the mall or HQ you were picked up at. Obviously for certain famous names, they’ll probably be the first ones out, but who knows… Maybe there was a traffic delay, and now you have some time to spare waiting around here as well. Just take note that you’re not allowed to wander too far from the Fairy Trial sets. Security is keeping an eye on folks to make sure they don’t steal or wreck anything.

And don’t worry, you’ll be told about the results within a week! They promise.

“You can make believe that what you say
Is what I want to hear.
I'll keep dancing through this
Beautiful delusional career.”

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[This is weird.

It's the first time Signless has really been close to him since they got here - mostly because he's been such a terrible coward. He'd made an appearance at the music festival short after their arrival, but he'd only watched from a distance. Make up and holograms worked fine and all, but...he just couldn't shake the feeling that he was going to get caught.

It was like being young all over again, the constant feeling that someone would somehow see what was beneath the surface. He has too much to lose, both here and back home. All the same, he steels himself and heads over.

Gold has enabled him to look perfectly human for the time being, retaining his black hair and with brown skin instead of grey. He wonders if Psii will recognize him at all like this, or of he would even in his true form.

When he speaks, he clearly has some kind of accent, but it's hard to say what it is exactly. He sound pretty much like a fan sneaking in for the chance to see their fav.]

Artolo Apemis?

[Oh fuck his nonexistent ass. Behind his shades, Artolo gives a grimace at the voice behind him. He was hoping he could avoid weird fan encounters for the day, he really was, but here they are! Steeling himself for the inevitable nonsense, he turns around, and- ]

[Weird. There's something familiar in the face he looks to, like a loose string being tugged at his thinkpan. Maybe he's seen it across a crowd, everything too crowded and bloated with energy. Three people at the front, oliveblood and jadeblood which is enough to make his jaw drop, but it's the one inbetween them that's drawing all the attention. Tiny nub horns, an offensive sort of smile, and bright red eyes, and there's a feeling striking in his chest like a tidal wave impact, and all he can think is ]

Holy garbage fondling fuck, I want to punch you in the face so bad, it's amazing.

[Well. Okay then. Signless pauses for a moment to process that, but not as much as a normal person might. He raises his eyebrows.]

May I ask why?

[Why indeed? Artolo knows he's an asshole prone to snappiness and picking fights. It's practically his thing. Yet it usually takes some sort of catalyst, even if that catalyst is someone getting sick of his asshole mouth.]

[For lack of a better answer, he bullshits.]

You remind me of a weirdo. [Nailed it.] What do you want?

[Despite everything, Signless laughs.

It's a genuine, mirthful laugh too. There's no spite or scorn. Somehow, 'you remind me of a weirdo' is just the most hilarious way of summarizing the situation to Signless's mind, and it makes it all feel like it's actually happening.

He covers his mouth but he can't stop himself, and he doesn't really know how to explain it, either.]

I'm sorry.

[It's his weak attempt at waving off her reaction, but even then he's still fighting off tittering.]

[...Yep, that's it, he attracts the freaks.]

So, uh, if it's all the same to you, I'm going to talk to people who aren't clearly high. And you can go stare at pretty colors or whatever.

[If you blame weird nonsense on someone in the conversation being high, it becomes so much easier to deal with.]

[Signless waves a hand, as if trying to brush off his overly giggly reaction.]

I'm sorry. It's just that...I had wondered if I might be familiar, and...you putting it that way just made so much sense...

[And just like that, every bit of him is focused on the guy. Without another word, he suddenly steps forward to invade his personal space and- holy shit this guy is short. Art knows he's a gangly piece of shit, but...]

[Nevermind, that doesn't matter. All he does is focus on squinting down at the guy past his shades, not saying anything. This face isn't one he's seen before, right...?]

[He really shouldn't be saying anything about this, because the whole point is that they are supposed to keep their presence hidden. It's just...so weird. And he can see that Art is looking for something in him, that might not be there right now. It strikes a note in him.]

That's a bit like how I felt when I first met you. Like I'd seen you before...but somewhere else. In a different life.

[An idealized version of Alternia, plus or minus a few things. He wonders what everything they did together looks like to a human.]

[When he first met him. Somehow, Artolo can tell that he's not talking about now. Yet there's still nothing, and it's infuriating. He wants to grab this short little asshole by the shoulders, shake him, and ]

[yell, no, scream, scream and cry and rage until his vocal chords give out and there's nothing but bloody yellow pulp in his throat. The area around the execution bloc is crowded, filled with legions and legions of guards, of trolls forced to watch, but the whole world might as well be a blur. Every tiny bit of him, as much as he loathes it, is focused in like an archer on the figure chained up in the middle. For all of his own screams, he knows it wouldn't drown out the screaming coming the person. The screams on either side of him don't drown it out, that's for damned sure, and, watching, all he can do is cry, and cry, he's]

[crying]

[He has no idea when he started, but there's an ache in his eyes, a knot in his throat, and tears are pouring out from behind his sunglasses and down his face. For a second, all Artolo can do is stare blankly at the person, expression losing its ferocious focus of a moment ago.]

[Gray skin. There should be gray skin. And blood, red, fucking burning red, like iron burning, it should be fucking everywhere, except not, because the figure he'd been forced to watch has been dead for hundreds of sweeps- Artolo's head is pounding, vicious from emotion and migraine and how much he's silently crying, and something else too, maybe, but he doesn't pay it any mind. It's like when he'd collapsed back in Pride, all those months ago, losing his lunch.]

[Pain seems so inconsequential. So mundane. Who gives a shit about it anymore?]

[Artolo tries to drawin breath, but it's wet and shaking, a rattle that bounces down through his throat and into the hollows of his chest.]

[Words, for once, are lost to him.]

☆TRACK IIX: BETTER TO PRETEND PT. 1

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i thought i had tagged this :\

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