metalogs | LOVE POTION #9

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LOVE POTION #9

LOVE IS... not in the air! The reintroduction of Confluences into this world has left it rocked, so the season of love is not quite as lovey-dovey as it usually is. People are stressed and anxious. Valentine's events are being cancelled left, right, and center in fear that a Confluence may catch young lovers unawares.

Unbeknownst to mortals, the God of Love really can't afford his month to be ruined by a few little dimensional catastrophes. This is his month! ... And for whatever reason, he seems to be stranded on the Earthly plane.

Surely he can fix things. Push it along a little. Though Gods don't usually meddle in mortal affairs, this is a personal catastrophe. All it takes is a few drops of love potion on a token of affection, and voila! Instant-connection.

(This event has a blanket warning for dubious consent of the love spell variety. To opt out completely, characters can simply not be in Sunset Falls at the time of the event, which runs through Valentine's Day.)

WHITE HEARTS FESTIVAL

Welcome to Sunset Falls, the most magical place in all of America! Literally. The streets are charged with magical energies, and while it won't be spinning your words into spells, it will give anyone who is magically inclined a comfortable little buzz. Maybe it's the boost you need to get a spell working, or maybe it's just a pep in your step. Confluence-displaced metas who take the Guilds up on their offer to tour the new housing will arrive just in time to witness the an annual tradition: The White Hearts Festival, a festival dedicated to all forms of love - familial, friendship, and romantic.

The whole town is decked out in pinks, golds and reds. Town square has been overtaken by food booths peddling elaborate meals and desserts with various magical effects. (It's probably better not to ask why some of the cookies being handed out are in the shape of anatomical hearts.)

Eat an emoji cookie and find yourself sprouting heart-eyes, or gaining a flurry of hearts above your head.

The Bolder Biscuit - by far and above the densest thing you've ever tried to eat - makes you bold. It compels you to march right up to someone and tell them what you think, good or bad.

And there's also the Firework Delight cake, which makes you shoot off literal fireworks the moment you touch that special someone that makes your life complete... but honestly, they go off when you touch anyone. Sorry if you end up giving off the wrong impression!

In addition, pop-up craft stands sell trinkets that guarantee you'll be together with your people forever and ever. The most popular item on sale this year appears to be the Eternal Bond - which is just an enchanted finger-trap that refuses to let go unless you tell someone a deep dark secret.

There is an altar at the town park where you can make your offering and give prayers to the God of Love in hopes he will smile favorable upon you. Lay your chocolate heart at its base and offer up a prayer to the God so that your life will be full of love and connection.

Truthfully, when it started it wasn't as cutesy as it is now. It became a lot more wholesome when people began to offer only chocolate hearts to the God of Love. Now it's fun for the whole family! ... So long as you don't veer into the woods. Some people still practice the old ways, and there are (what you hope to be) animal hearts nailed to trees. This is Sunset Falls, after all. Weird often goes hand in hand with terror.

LONELY HEARTS

For those of you who don't yet have those special people, lonely hearts still single can collect white rose enamel pins from the festival committee. They're expected to pick someone to give it out to as a declaration of their attraction by the end of the festival. However... there seems to be an issue this year. There's more pins here than there are people in town. Committee members start handing them out to anyone, single or not, and from there that's where things start to get a little weird...

You clip the pin onto your shirt and at once, your life has suddenly become a romcom. Everything is just a little brighter, the sounds a little more musical (sometimes literally), and you're suddenly compelled to reach out and find connection.

And the universe is conspiring to bring it your way! Cliches won't stop happening around you. Suddenly people are determined to give you a makeover so you can catch the eye of an admirer. Your friends are betting on your romantic future. A complex love triangle is springing out of previously platonic friendships.

You're not not limited to one partner, and that partner doesn't need to be romantic. It could be a best friend, or a nemesis that you're compelled to fight over and over again for the joy of it. What matters is the connection and the way the world seems to stop at nothing to give you that perfect three act structure: You Meet, You Lose, You Get.

Reach the end of your romcom's little arc and you'll find yourself freed from the spell... and probably will have some choice words for its caster.

HEARTS ON FIRE

Regardless of how you participate in the festival, everyone is at risk when the town itself falls under a love spell.

This may be unlike anything you've known before. Perhaps it's the first stumbling steps of puppy love. You want to be with this person all the time. Hold their hands and work up the courage for a kiss. Or perhaps this is something fierce and passionate. You want to be kissing them always, pursuing these passions heedless of consequences.

This doesn't need to be a romantic love. It can be strong and familial. Perhaps the sort you've always desired but never had. You could fall into a family unit with others affected by the spell. Compelled to hug each other and say words of encouragement or praise. Perhaps you, while living your own love story, are the best friend in someone else's - offering up the speech that tells them they deserve more than they think they do.

Whatever your flavor of love may be, you're prone to dramatic declarations. Confessions at the drop of a hat. It's go big or go home, and since nobody's going home right now, you might as well go as big as you can. Perhaps you're arranging for Flash Mobs to declare your feelings! Or making plans to move in together despite only having met a few hours ago.

This is all fine and well at first, but it may become clear pretty quickly that characters who try to hold their burning passions are likely to burn themselves! If you're the repressed type and you try to resist the compulsions that the love spell puts on you, you might just burst into flames, and someone will need to put you out. Don't worry — move quick enough, and there won't be any lasting damage, and if there is, the Guilds' healers can help you out.

MEET CUTE-PID

For those paying attention to that sort of thing, one constant of all these wild declarations can be spotted in the background. A tall man with curly blonde hair and an all too charming smile never seems to be far from the romance.

Those who are curious enough to follow will find he retreats to a lavish mansion on the outskirts of town. The mansion has the gaudy and abundant decor of a honeymoon suite on the Las Vegas Strip, with lights attuned to music and a massive twirling heart above the roof of the building. Peer inside and you will see hundreds of tiny viewing windows, each depicting a different romantic story unfolding outside of town. The door to the mansion appears to be locked tight and the windows are magically sealed, but some quick thinking may get you inside.

If anyone wants to engage him, HERE is a top level where we will summarize encounters. The more PCs involved in an encounter, the bigger its outcome will be. We will determine the impact on the god of love on Valentine's Day, so get your comments in by end of day on the 13th! You may also use this top level to ask event-specific questions about the effects on this page! (Please refer general questions about the setting to the FAQ, and refer any player plots to the PLOTTING page.)

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"Technically, the role name of the other prince is just that. The Other Prince. Gotta love minor credits," Bart said, chuckling a little.

"Sometimes I wonder what it might be like to be the person who makes you happy. You deserve that, too."

"Ah, but I'm a fan of the non-movie," David counters, smirking. Though he's left flustered for a moment over what Bart says.

"Let's not talk about me. This is about you, Bart."

"Fine, but if the prince of my dreams doesn't show up, you at least owe me a dance."

He finds a place where they can sit an continue this makeover montage, and he doesn't really notice their musical accompaniment as he leans back to let David start with what might be the hardest thing he has to tame and style. The boy has a lot of hair.

"Promise," David assures him. "And we'll find you your prince, sooner or later. You deserves it, Bart. All my friends deserve that love."

But the montage is just what they need. Little light bits of conversation as David works that he won't remember later, music that he won't hear, and shared laughter as he tries to cheer Bart up with the work. Of course he leaves Bart alone for a bit, sans mirror, to go collect makeup, and even comes back to work on that too. It won't be until after that point that their montage would release them, leaving David to finally produce a mirror he didn't remember buying to reveal the final creation to Bart. It's a beautifully complex braid sketching complex patterns set with beads and pins that sparkle like jewels and trapped stars in his hair. His makeup is of course all chosen to accent and highlight his eyes, and even make his features a bit more elegant and mature looking.

And David beams on in pride.

"Imagine what I could do with a few days and access to your wardrobe."

"I hate shopping. Maybe I should hire you to be my regular stylist."

"If you want attention, hire Loki. If you want comfort and looking good, I can give some advice sometimes."

X-23 hadn't wanted to talk to Jean but hadn't wanted to not talk to her either. Because that would mean she was letting Jean matter enough to care whether they were talking or not. She had been doing just fine on her own and didn't want all of that worry and concern stinking up the air around here. It made her skin itch in a weird tingly way.

But it's hard to feel all of that when you're staring at someone with hearts swirling around their head. What do you even do with that?

"Surprising that I'd investigate how this place works?"

Oh, this? No! This is for a friend. Lorna.

[ Except as readily and easily the answer comes:

(A small but reasonable assumption! A tiny overstep of warm implication!
An easy retraction with the playing field left wide open to be stumbled right into!)

There's something else. Something about it being wrong.
But not being wrong. Too. About already being spoken for?

That thrums with a well-worn refusal to have been forgotten. Anywhere. Ever.
Jean frowns. The box of chocolates in her hand almost too solid against it. ]

"I'd rather not have the eye of a god on me. It's usually not good for your health in the long-run, even when they like you," Bart said, seriously.

"So, what goes with all this...glitz?" He's not really sure what to think of the image in the mirror, although the hair doesn't move an inch as he moves, and a part of him wonders if it will stay even at superspeed. If so, that will be new.

Yeah, say that to the guy that hasn't absolutely gotten... awkwardly hot and heavy with the resident one. Life choices were not actively made, but yeah, not good.

"Well, I'd suggest a nice shirt and vest, but I like vests.'

Oh, that's great!

[ he beams suddenly, though manages his overreaction quickly. ]

I mean, not great. [ he laughs. ] You know what I mean.

[ his life wasn't this. the casual romance, awkward repartee's back and forth as two lovers avoid their own attraction for one reason or another. he was a sad man who lived in a bad city who lived through tragedy and dressed up like a bat to stop it from repeating itself, but still... ]

I guess that means you don't have a Valentine yet?

"This place, no," Jean gives easily enough in a generic way. "But all this?"

This silly foofaraw of a festival that she was pretty sure Logan wouldn't have done if they hadn't basically rounded a corner on it in the announcements on the way to look at this newest city with everyone else. All these booths, the kitch, everything. Done up in flowers and hearts. People making awkward and sweet romantic gestures, lovers and friends and family jostling everywhere, close together, arm in arm.

"I didn't think a Valentine's Festival would be the first place we might run into each other again." Because it bears saying, without a pause. "I'm glad to see you're looking better."

Jean is not positive she wants to acknowledge this, but words like those keep coming out of his mouth, and that has to stop. "Okay, you -- "

Words. She has them, and they solidify as she squats down, enough to let her hand float a second before deciding that hesitation is just not going to work where it comes to the face of insanity. Her hands settle on his shoulders, and she's pulling without any more warning than he gave her, to begin with. "You need to get up now."

But as she's dragging him up, there's an off flicker of warmth that slides up her arms (and maybe even a shift in the tempo of a guitar being played by someone standing on the bench not too far away). Not the sharp, fast one, but something smoother, softer, almost ... sympathetic.

Edited 2022-02-09 05:17 (UTC)

[ She does! She knows what he means, but somehow her expression doesn't change. She doesn't laugh along or smile companionably at this newest little slip. That barely-there edge of confusion stays in the crinkle between her brows. That feeling pushing up against the back of her, like she's supposed to be talking, that little desperate panic telling she's forgotten the next step in a dance, and she needs to course-correct fast before she offends Bruce.

Jean opens her mouth to say something, even if it's an apology (for what, she doesn't know), but Bruce beats her to the following words with that question. That. Question. It's like the tinkle of chimes, asking for a response. It's like a hammer hitting something so far away. It's more like she feels rather than hears the echo of the connection between the two. A shadow so far in the distance it looks like a line. But one so upright that Ozymandias would weep.

(And of course, she doesn't, right? Always a bridesmaid, never a bride, right? Friends with the best of sweepingly romantic stories of torrid passion and sweet content intertwined, right? Terrible building super's and weird roommates and awkward copy boys who ramble and spill coffee, but not ... someone, right? That's not how the stories go. Right?)

Her mouth opens again (there's only ever one right answer here, and from it unlocks all the doors in the hallways of the future), but all she can get to come out is. ]

I --

"I don't recall using the word amazing," Matthew says. The rest, however, gets him frowning. He hates having to consider such things.

"I think you should be careful how you speak to me, David. You don't know anything about it."

[This old thing? The way the man says it makes it sound like it's just something he threw on, like he didn't put thought into what he was wearing. And given what it looked like on the guy, he doubted it. With a smile as if it wasn't of any consequence, he let his fingers reach out and oh so briefly touch the trailing scarf. For the briefest moment he let his shields down and reached for the material, asking it to tell him it's history. It meant his own clothes clamored for his attention but he was good at shunting that away.]

This was selected with care, only days ago, and while it's not out and out couture, it's definitely big name designer.

Me? I'm just high end boutique, but not that high end. And lacking the dreamy, romantic edge that pirate stories come with.

[Because he is giving the benefit of the doubt that the guy doesn't mean pirates in the South China Sea. Then he took the offered hand and was happy to shake it.]

David. I'd offer my last name but you didn't give yours. Unless you're like Cher and only go by one.

Maybe he needed to consider them more.

"I don't have to know all the details to see what sorta bootlicker you are for your masters. And here you are, finally getting a chance to be free."

[ Balthier quirks a brow. He's seen a variety of abilities and magicks since he arrived, but this is new to him. He's a bit jealous, truth be told. ]

Well that's a lovely trick. I suppose I'll have to lean harder on the romance, since you've taken my modesty from me.

[ Bluntness, a good eye. Ah, Balthier does have a type. ]

Sounds like this Cher fellow shares my excellent taste. Just Balthier. [ He nearly says unless you knew me as Ffamran. That hasn't slipped in years. ]

A pleasure to meet you, David of the secret family name.

[Jealousy was not a good idea for this one power. Before David had control over it, it had nearly driven him out of his mind. Now here he was, making a casual display of a power that had become a constant form of support in his life. Last world, it had been how he made his money.]

Something about the look of you says modesty isn't in your normal skill set. But I ask your forgiveness for taking something so rare and thus valuable.

[The words were half playful, and mostly just sassy.]

Cher lady. She gets away with it because she's a famous musician and performer. I think you can get away with it just from the whole thing you've got going here.

[Why is he flirting? No clue. But maybe those fireworks had given him a moment of hope.]

I'm sure the pleasure is mine. You said something about pirates?

He gets up. (And up, and up - at least Jean is used to tall people.) His expression could best be described as that of a loyal dog delighted to see its master.

"Of course. Anything you say. Anything."

He absolutely does.

Anger has always been Matthew's biggest problem. (Aside from, well. Everything else.) When denied what he thinks he deserves, when disrespected, his temper flares and it usually ends in violence. It is also when he's angry that he's sloppiest and prone to mistakes.

He knows that attacking David is a terrible idea. It's a hard thought to hold on to, especially when the simple idea of freedom sends a bird of panic fluttering in his chest.

Matthew looms over David. "And what 'sort' is that? You know nothing of what I was created for."

"I don't have to," David answered, meeting his gaze without flinching. "I see what you're like, and hear you were created. And that tells me all I need to know about your world and the cruelty in it. Learn to have fun, Matthew. Learn to LIVE."

Matthew blinks, then sneers. "What is WITH you people and talking about fun? I have fun!"

No he doesn't.

"Oh yeah? Prove it."

David crossed his arms over his chest and started at Matthew in challenge. He's waiting for confirmation of fun.

"Work IS fun!" Ha! Suck on THAT, David!

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LOVE POTION #9

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Re: II. Setting a Spark

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Re: II. Setting a Spark

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