etcircenses: (Default)
Panem Events ([personal profile] etcircenses) wrote in [community profile] thecapitol2015-01-20 10:58 pm

The Crowning Of The Signless

Who| Everyone.
What| The Crowning of The Signless.
Where| An alcove in a nearby mountain.
When| From dusk to dawn, on Thursday.
Warnings/Notes| This event is mandatory for all Tributes to attend. Even if you do not tag in, your character will attend this party. Peacekeepers will be on high alert. There will be no chance to runaway.

Tributes are encouraged to sleep all during the day, before the crowning. The reason for this is revealed when they are roused at sundown and brought to the closest mountain to the city, where they are greeted by an alcove within the moutainside that has been carved into a temple to what may be an illicit faith. The stone alcove is dim-lit by candles arranged along walls and by what appears to be altars set before iron cancer signs, some plain, some inlet with intricate carvings. Bright red drapery hangs about the room, tapestries with the cancer sign and cirles of blending color spectrum. There are also some waist high leggings hung upon one wall. In the center of the room, shackles hang, glowing bright from some sort of internal heat and light. A hole in the ceiling is set on each side of it, to allow the smoke to escape from the great bonfire that roars beneath it. If one takes a seat upon any of large stones and logs aranged around it, they can see both the stars twinkling down and the way the smoke looks as though it is coming off the shackles.

The only windows otherwise are made from stained glass depicting images from the Signless's life, such as his rescue by "Alternia's First Mother" (so described on the metal plate below), "The Recording of His Teachings" depicting The Disciple writing the Signless's words into a book, "A New Follower" showing the Psiioniic joining the Signless, a boat deemed "The First Ship", and "The Execution" which features the death of the Signless before thousands of followers, a fifth troll- resembling Terezi- bearing the shackles as a necklace and another with great brown wings, a single window of Karkat and Kankri Vantas, as well as a sinister depiction of six indistinct shadowy figures of cerulean, blue, indigo, violet, tyrian, and maroon. Cave-style paintings cover the stone walls, styles ranging from simple scribbled etching to circles featuring twelve colors in circle, with bright red at the center, and yet more elaborate shadowy depictions of those in the stained glass, esepcially the Signless himself, both prior and following his execution.

But not all is dedicated to the Signless and his old posse of biblical age trolls. A shrine has been set up for redeemed and then so quickly lost victor, Matthew 'Punchy' O'Conner. Punchy has been painted upon a cave wall like he fits right into the theme. Upon his shrine lay all varieties of bling; Bling-jewelery, a bling goblet, bling boxing gloves, a hoodie, a nun habit, and a stone with a memorial rap engraved atop-- with bling, of course, all shimmering by the spotlights placed before the shrine. Refillable 40 oz bottles are lain out so that sorrowful guests, wishing to pay their respect to the boy so cruelly slain by rebels when he had turned from them, can pour one out in his honor.

Marius is also honored there with a tea light and small framed photograph set upon an empty table with an empty chair, along with souvenir versions of his and Cosette's wedding rings that guests can take home. Beneath all these rings is a photoshopped picture of javert with a single tear running down his manly face.

The only seating besides the stones and logs and Marius's single chair, are those that are sat at a table at the end of the room. Each is draped in a different color, six on each side for each district and each blood hue-- presumably of the Victor's choosing. Between these chairs sits yet one more with a tall back like a flogging jut that got the redesigned at the base to make a throne that some trolls might recognize as belonging to the Empress. The arms of the chair feature open shackles. The throne is decorated in chains of gold and jewels of all colors. The victor is given a crown of gilded flowers and thorns on chain.

Food can be found upon the altars or the victor's table, in surplus. Alternian delicacies are served, featuring insects, flavored or plain, and food made from insects. Guests may find a giant beetle being served upon a spit roast. Even the meats appear to be topped with bugs. The cakes, marshmallows (which can be roasted with stick by the fire!), and orange creamsicles may be the only things truly bug-free. Drink options are water, wine, and soda.

Stylists are encouraged to dress their tributes primarily in black, with a single bit of color put into the design matched according to district (with exception to trolls), or any manner of draping fabrics, cloaks, and costumery reminiscent of religious iconagraphy that one might expect of ancient aliens. Waist high pants and leggings are also in high regard, as well as fake horn, fangs, contacts, and anything to make guests look more trollish. The only rule is for the main colors to match to the blood assignment.

The music playing is the sort one might expect from a church, featuring mournful vocals, soft bells and melodies, and of course, organ music. But for one or two jarring differences. Where this music is coming from remains a mystery but since the space is open and clear, guests have plenty of room for dancing.

Those who don't wish to dance can talk and regale tales around the bonfire, or may instead seek out the book of "scripture" at one of the altars that features nothing more than various parables- with names that Tributes might recognize! Each Tribute has one parable contained within, telling a tale in flourished manner of a part of their life, featuring a pro-capitol moral at the end.

Elsewhere, are models of the flogging just, where guests can put their hands through the oversized cuffs and pretend to writhe in agony, an Alternian bioware helm where guests too can pretend to have their lifeforce and power used a battery for the sake of the Alternian empire, a dress-up station where guests can customize their appearance to match trolls sold into gruelling slavery to seadwellwers, and an area designed to look like a cave with extensive "Alternian" (gibberish) writings of the Signless's words, where guests too can pretend they've lost everyone they love and are carrying on their legacy by writing upon the walls and leaving their own messages of love and mourning. Not to mention, a life-sized drone with realistic piercing claws, for all your picture posing needs.

A sandpit lies just around a corner for children to make castles, dig trenches, and act out games of pretending they've trekked thousands of miles through zombie infested desert just to speak to a couple of people! Guests can also meet a "mutantblood lusus" a four-eyed crab creature with lizardlike structure-- only sized no bigger than the average dog and perhaps about as intelligent. Guests are warned not to put their hand too close, lest the claw pincers manage to pinch them.

Late into the crowning, everyone is brought out to the dark mountainside, well monitored by peacekeepers, and divided into teams. Everyone is given belts with velcro flags attached, colored according to the "blood" they were matched with by district. Those in the eighth, ninth, twelfth, third, tenth, and eleventh districts are deemed the "lowbloods. Those in the first, fourth, second, fifth, sixth, and seventh districts, are deemed the "highbloods". Each team is given a velcro board to attach the flags to. The first team to lose all their flags loses, winners getting tiny necklace copies of the shackles. The last one standing with a flag wins a larger necklace copy and the option to get it redesigned into a symbol of their choosing.

If you failed not to be "culled", fear not! All tributes receive a participation sticker at the end. This sticker features a number. It is not indicative of districts or of age, as will be announced shortly, but of the new scoring. These will be announced for everyone to hear- and pick out targets from.

The crowning officially ends with the coming dawn. And so begins, to everyone's surprise, preparation for the arena. Tributes will be going right from the crowning off to the Tribute launch tubes. Happy Hunger Games!

[Note: This is ICly on Thursday! Just before the arena on Friday!]
reassures: (flicker ☙ you pluck my nerves)

[personal profile] reassures 2015-02-16 12:32 pm (UTC)(link)
For what little Nill knows of the Signless, none of it involved what Karkat is telling her now. Maybe she should have asked the Signless himself about it, but it just hadn't occurred to her. Right now, however, the story brings her an odd sense of deja vu. She lifts her head to look around the room, the stained glass, the torture methods, before finally her gaze settles on the window with the Dolorosa and the young Signless.

She remembers all at once why it seems so familiar. She thinks back to the church, the services, the stories that the Bishop told to his meager congregation. 'He died for our sins so that we might have everlasting life.' 'His disciples followed him always until he was betrayed and killed.'

Was... was the Signless Jesus? Troll Jesus? Was she friends with Jesus?

Her wings shift and settle again against her back.

he's very nice.
I can see why they followed him.


Give her a minute, she's still processing the jesus thing.
crabmunicator: (048)

[personal profile] crabmunicator 2015-02-19 05:32 am (UTC)(link)
Troll Jesus and Troll Jesus's prophesied second coming, really. Karkat doesn't know jack shit about Human Jesus, though; he still thinks the word has a g in it.

"They were out of their pans," he fires back. "They followed a dude who in every inch was heretical cullbait, in behavior and very existence, and they listened to him and thought they could make a difference through what he said. This was a guy who got pretty much every trace of him wiped out of history, who didn't change anything in the end--just got culled so hard he swore really loudly about it. I got a sign and a lusus out of it somehow, but that's basically it."

He shifts his posture until he has an elbow propped on his leg and his chin in his hand. How much does she actually know about troll culture?

He starts again in a quieter voice, "I told you before how I'm a mutant, right? It's not just that. Blood is everything. Our whole caste system is based around it, and blood informs biology and powers and lifespan, and who gets to treat which troll in what way, and what will or won't be tolerated. Our Empress wouldn't be the Empress if not for the right blood color, no matter how vicious and ruthlessly capable at ruling she is. And those things--being vicious, ruthless--those were what made a troll in Alternian society. You have to be strong and badass, not have any weaknesses, be ready to kill if you have to--even expected to in certain social circumstances. To be weak is to invite someone to take you out. Imperfections, mutations, disabilities--those are all reasons to be culled, or any other arbitrary reason if you just fuck up the wrong way.

"And that--all that--is what my ancestor tried to go against."
Edited 2015-02-19 05:34 (UTC)
reassures: (fade ☙ beg for you to let me in)

[personal profile] reassures 2015-03-20 04:32 pm (UTC)(link)
Nill actually did meet someone a ways back that claimed to be God. He wasn't an unpleasant person, and she would have no doubt actually liked him if he had just been another person and not the supposed creator of the universe and all life. But he was, and because of that Nill was constantly on the fence about whether or not to hate him. She's fairly certain he was also an alcoholic, which... was not as surprising as it should have been. Jesus was a whole other issue though. Son of the virgin mother and God, died for sins, so on and so forth. What she knew of him never led her to be as angry about him as she was about God.

If she ever got to see the Bishop again she'd have to find someone to read her notes to him. He always said he'd never seen God.

As Karkat goes on Nill lifts her gaze to look in the general direction of the Signless, quiet and thoughtful. She liked him a great deal, but she got a better image of him in the Initiate's head than she would ever get just from looking herself. In the Arena, though still heavily drugged, the Signless had glowed in the Initiate's eyes. He was wonderful and good, and in the Initiate's original timeline he would die horribly. She can't decide what the worst part of all this is.

did he change anything?
crabmunicator: (096)

[personal profile] crabmunicator 2015-03-22 02:42 pm (UTC)(link)
Karkat looks over at her words and sighs. "No. Like I said, not really. Society changed over the centuries, but it was for other reasons, and not something he directly did. Society was still as ruthlessly awful in my time as it was in his--maybe even more so, because adults would leave the planet to go aid the empire and help conquer places. You couldn't just stick around and wander and preach."

He's downplaying it some: he's sure the Signless had to have his own struggles. Alternia was never easy. It can't have been, not after the changes instated by the scratch, by Doc Scratch, and the presence of Gl'bgolyb as a tool of control.

"The most I got was a chance to live at all, but once I reached adulthood--if I reached adulthood--I would have been culled without making it off the planet."
reassures: (fade ☙ the heavy weight of stone)

[personal profile] reassures 2015-03-29 08:33 pm (UTC)(link)
Maybe he wasn't Jesus after all. She's fairly certain - from what little she learned, and having not been exposed to it for years - that Jesus's death was supposed to have made the world a better place. He died horribly of course (the image of the young dead man nailed to boards is easy enough to summon), but at the very least he made the people that were around him better than what they might have been otherwise. Bishop would know the stories better than she would, but it had mattered.

would they have let him live if he had a different blood color?
do you know what happened to the others?
the Ψiioniic?
the jade blood?
crabmunicator: (051)

[personal profile] crabmunicator 2015-03-30 08:49 pm (UTC)(link)
"Not if he was still preaching the things he did," he says with a shake of his head. "Though his blood color wouldn't be a cullable offense on its own then. Not that it takes much to give a highblood reason when you're low on the spectrum."

He's not even bitter, really. It's the way things were, and even if it was fucked up, he has the acceptance of living with it and the cooled perspective of three years of life past his society's destruction.

For the other questions, he motions first at the helm display. "The Psiioniic got taken as a helmsman. That's what they did with powerful psionics--they used them for engines, basically, for space ships. Wired them in. Their powers made for faster travel than you could get without one."

Again, he's not as affected as he might be. They've already got the instruments of his ancestor's torture hung up for display, so what's another on top? At least helmsmanship was more normalized, horrifying implications or no.

"Then the jade one, Kanaya's ancestor... Fuck, what was her title? D something? I think she got sold into slavery." He scratches his chin in thought. "I don't know what happened after. And the Disciple--she went into hiding. That's what the cave over there is about, I think," he says with a motion. "She preserved his word and all that, for all what good it did."