LATE AF SEPT CATCHALL

[impostorsyndrome]

🧙 WHO: Kadoc and a bunch of people, including perhaps your character?!
⚔️️ WHAT: There sure is a lot of dumb shit happening in the month of September. Both OPEN and CLOSED prompts, the latter in the comments!
🕒 WHEN: IT'S—the month of September. (More specifically, the span from the beginning of the month to the first part of the event, ending before any dragon problems!)
🗺️ WHERE: Here there and everywhere, including Celliwig, ~the club~, straight up prison, and other assorted places around Camelot.
⚠️ WARNINGS: Eventual branding/tattoo/pain stuff, the subsequent servitude that comes along with that prompt, language, sexual themes in ~the club~, likely violence/actiony antics in the jailbreak, animal capture and implied slaughter for food in the event prompt, and I'll add anything else!


1. Kadoc the Stubborn Husky (early Sept., OPEN, thanks a lot Claude)

[Kadoc needs a second opinion. Maybe even a third, fourth, and further opinions. Claude is a lovable scamp and all, but Kadoc is a paranoid bastard, and he can't quite convince himself that he's not being had with the whole—howling thing. He sounds fine to his own ears! He's probably not an Animal Mage, although boy would this be a typically embarrassing way for that to make itself known if he were!

He needs confirmation, but after how that went with Claude, he can't quite bring himself to walk up to anyone and just start talking. What if he really is making dog noises?! So, instead, he's gathering his courage to approach people he recognizes as offworlders and . . . hold up his tablet, on which he has a Notes file open, with this typed in a large, visible font:]

I NEED YOUR HELP. NOTHING DANGEROUS.

[ . . . This could have been an email a network post, but he's not exactly on his game right now. Who can blame him?]


2. Jailhouse Rock (early Sept., CLOSED to Kate, Jailbreak quest)
Here!

3. Amanita Bigger Basket (early Sept., CLOSED to Ritsuka, Celliwig's month of magical mushes)
Here!

4. Super Smash Bros Part 2: The Revenge of the Smash (mid Sept., CLOSED to Itaru, The Pain-Tolerant Badass)
Here!

5. Your Obedient Servant (mid Sept., CLOSED to Rinea, The Caring Badass)
Here!

6. Lukewarm Knights (mid Sept., CLOSED to Gareth and Ritsuka, Hot Knights quest)
Here!


7. Jailbreak Part 2: The Great Goosening (late Sept., OPEN, the cute part of the event)

[Kadoc has had, to say the least, an unlucky month—but here finally there's a break, or at least a small pleasure. He's already spent plenty of time out in the wilderness gathering mushrooms this month and was debating whether to bother going on an end-of-month hunt, only for the hunt to come to him for once. A chance to grab a pre-fattened goose for their table to go with all those mushrooms? Don't mind if he does!

The geese have other ideas, of course. By now, Kadoc's managed to humanely return several of them to the farm; his Light magic helps there. It's no big deal to snap them up in cages of hard light and then carry those back to where they belong. But geese are smart. Geese are watching him. And when he finally snaps up the fattest of the geese he can find to take home for himself, shutting it up in another light cage and hefting it under his arm, that's when they make their move.

Catch Kadoc racing down the streets of Camelot, vaguely in the direction of his home, but mostly just in any direction that's away from the ten furious honking geese in hot pursuit of him. He's only barely watching where he's going. Watch out, or you could get swept up in this disaster and end up a feather pillow yourself!

Or save him. Someone, please save him from this entire month.]


(( Check out my plotting meme post here if you're interested in setting anything else up with Kadoc this month outside of the upcoming event; I'm happy to oblige! Also if I forgot to get one up hmu. It was a lot lol ))

Comments

2.

[impostorsyndrome]

[Big PY, huh. Kadoc isn't up for every quest that crosses the Dark Web—some of them are more nasty than he wants to get involved with, and others are just stupid—but this one falls within the range of things he's willing to do. It's not like it's great that there were casualties of that last big rager, but it's an acceptable enough crime to overlook for the profit that might come of it. Hell, he's done worse.

He usually avoids quests that involve projected combat, but it's possible to be creative about avoiding combat sometimes, and this is one of those times—he hopes. God, does he hope. He is not remotely prepared to take on prison guards, but he is prepared to escape from them, and here's to that being all he needs to deal with this evening. This is a quest he would have avoided not too long ago for lack of confidence in his magic, but . . . it's time. Kadoc's been practicing illusion and invisibility on the daily since about a month after arriving, and now's the chance to put that experience to the test.

But to start with, he's scoping out the perimeter and entrance, hooded and masked and dressed in dark green to sink into the darkening twilight. Which, you know, suspicious as hell if he's seen, but so far so good, between a combination of keeping to the shadows and slipping into invisibility if anyone gets within potential line of sight. So far so good . . . he thinks.

He's been lucky enough to avoid any law enforcement notice thus far, which is what really matters, but he's also not the only one attempting a jailbreak tonight, and he's forgotten to account for that possibility. What are the odds, anyway? Two in one night? (They're very good.)]

slides in here finally

[morns]

( dark web quests are a mixed bag, but so are the above board ones. Kate doesn't mind either way — though the shady ones pay better, on average. this kind of work is a little to the left of her usual jobs, but at the same time... well. a jailbreak is kinder on the conscience than an assassination.

(Marc would balk, but Marc isn't here and that's a discussion they'll never have. it isn't worth it.)

she's hiding her hair because it makes sense to, burying it all under a black beanie which is a bit too much for the season (and the amount of hair on her head) but will have to do. unfortunately, it would be too easy to simply teleport in and out, since she doesn't know what's on the inside and there's no way this place isn't warded in some way against that. so instead, she's on the outside, scoping everything out from a distance, gradual in her approach.

she barely notices the fact she isn't alone, frowning at the occasion strange flicker of shadows or light but writing it off as animals (bats, maybe?) until she comes face to... uh, masked face with a stranger. )

Fucking—!

( a shocked hiss slithers out from between her teeth as she half-stumbles back, just about retaining her balance by grabbing the nearest solid object.

not the way she expected to run into anyone tonight, that's for sure. )

slides BACK . . . also finally

[impostorsyndrome]

Shit—!

[Well, misery loves company, and this is a miserable way to meet your jailbreakin' company. They'd both blended in a little too well here, huh? Kadoc flails backwards, wheeling but managing to stay upright, and shoves one hand into the kangaroo pocket of his hoodie in case he needs a smoke bomb. (Said smoke bomb is one of the smoke gourds Gundham had invented a while back, and using it in the facility might be something of a nightmare, but outside, this could save his ass.)

Luckily, his brain catches up before his body decides to act and throw the thing. He can't identify who this is at a glance, but he can tell she's probably someone scoping out this prison for the exact same reason he is tonight; this is not the look or demeanor of a guard patrolling the area. Phew.

Now it's (probably) just embarrassing instead of the end of this venture.]

—Fuck. Sorry! I—nevermind. Not worth explaining. You good?

3.

[impostorsyndrome]

[Going out and doing his camping, hunting, or foraging is usually Kadoc's way of getting away from other people for a while; he rarely invites anyone along with him on these trips. But this month he'll show good faith to Fujimaru and make an exception. She'd brought it up first! Come to think of it, she's mentioned "farming" for "materials" before, hasn't she . . . ? It's not a skill he would have expected her to have, but then again, there's an agonizing amount he doesn't actually know about how things operated behind the scenes at Chaldea in his absence.

This is a good chance to find out. And it's also another good chance to make some money, and Kadoc is finding that he enjoys that, after years of never having to consider his funds too deeply.

It's not too long a journey from the very north of Camelot's city limits to the very south of the Dusklight Woods where the mushrooms grow; the timing works out so that they're approaching the edge of the forest around daybreak after a late journey. Perfect mushroom hunting time! Kadoc . . . does not have a spring in his step, and if he did everyone would be immediately aware he was some kind of doppelganger inhabiting Kadoc's body, but despite the late travels, he's pretty upbeat for him as they come up on the sight of the tree line in the distance.]

Good timing. . . . I'm really banking on not everyone being willing to travel out like this, no matter how lucrative this might end up being. Which could be pretty damn lucrative depending on how lucky we get.

[fujimaru]

[ Ritsuka... also does not have a spring in her step. Actually, she's yawning semi-frequently behind one hand, and she's got a thermos of coffee in her bag that she has already taken a chug from more than once on the way out. Of all the times to miss gold apples, now is definitely one where she feels it.

But she's not complaining despite that, and for all her yawning, she is pretty alert. She might not be at the same level of being used to physical deprivation that Kadoc is, but she's also pretty used to operating on (sometimes severely) reduced amounts of sleep and food.

As it is, she squints at the forest ahead of them, like her eyesight is good enough to actually see into it. She can't, but there's still that instinctive attempt. ]

It'd be nice to be rich for once... [ Another brief yawn, muffled behind her hand. ] Is the idea that we're beating the crowd? Or are they like, I dunno, like morning glories and they just close up when it gets too hot or something?

[ It is entirely possible that she is kind of asleep on her feet--the caffeine hasn't kicked in quite yet--and is just saying the first random stupid shit that comes to mind. That happens sometimes. ]

[impostorsyndrome]

[Well, he'd been warned she didn't know anything about mushroom hunting. He snorts when she compares them to morning glories, and he's not even that unkind about it. As they trudge closer to the forest's edge, he digs out his own thermos of coffee from his pack and unscrews the lid. Precious lifeblood.]

They don't close up. It's just a beating the crowd thing. And if there doesn't end up being a crowd, we'll have all day to wait for more to pop up as the ground warms up and snipe those too. But I'm guessing we'll run into Celliwig natives out here, if no one else.

4.

[impostorsyndrome]

[It had taken some pressing on Itaru's part after Kadoc's devastating loss in the Mario Party tournament, buuuuut okay, it turns out hanging out together to play video games is also something friends just do and not just a thing you do to show other people up in public. Kadoc can understand that.

(Are they friends? Mmmmmaybe?! This is at least a start on that.)

No more Mario Party, though. Hell no! And Kadoc doesn't own a console, though he's honestly considering it with some of that extra money he's been raking in this month. So whatever embarrassment is going to happen here today, it's going to be public: they're having their showdown at an arcade in Camelot, dueling on a cabinet oldschool style! . . . The game in question is not actually Super Smash Bros.; it's a Camelot-specific fighting game called Fists of the Bloody Table. It feels more fair anyway to do this with a game neither of them can possibly have had much life experience with. Kadoc's scoped it out and learned the ropes before today's duel!!!, but no one's going to be an expert here.

. . . Probably. There's no saying how much Itaru might have studied the game before today.

Well, Kadoc knew what he was getting into. There's a bet on the line today, and he damn well expects to lose it. He would never have agreed to anything against Itaru that he wasn't okay losing; he knows better! Mario Party remembers!

But he hasn't lost yet. Even Kadoc knows better than to count himself out on the character selection screen, tempting as it is. He's not going to just let Itaru win! Hmm, this knight character named Lady Luscious Lionheart looks promising . . . ]

[rateup]

[ this is a start of an unlikely(?) friendship, it's true. it's almost hilarious and kind of sad that kadoc relented on itaru's whims at kotarou's post a while back, but it just proves that itaru's charisma stat is effective as ever! or maybe kadoc's just that much of a softie like itaru thought...

either way, this actually gets itaru to come out of his room for once aside from theater activities, so he welcomes the change of scenery. luckily for kadoc, he was too distracted with his own backlog of games to do some research on the arcade game scene, so he'll be coming into this showdown blind as heck. he enters the arcade with his usual casual gait, peering over kadoc's shoulder to check out the character select screen. ]

Damn. She looks luscious, all right.

[ hey, man. ]

[impostorsyndrome]

Ugh. Don't say it like that! Makes me not wanna pick her.

[As if his own reasons for choosing this character were entirely pure or something. He'll never cop to it, but it's not like Kadoc is immune to lusciousness. This armor Lionheart is wearing? Definitely not historically accurate or likely to protect her from very much in combat. But she's got a good kit too, okay!

For all his grumbling, he is going to pick her. Kadoc shifts over to make more room on the other side of the cabinet for Itaru.]

You checked this game out at all yet?

5.

[impostorsyndrome]

[There's a lot going on this month that's uncannily familiar to Kadoc—uncanny in the sense that it's similar, but Off. The whole tattooing process had been one of those things. Kadoc may not have any tattoos per se, but he's been through his share of painful magical rituals in his youth; receiving his family's Crest had not been a pleasant experience, to say the least. It never is. But mages, where he comes from, go through it anyway, because it needs to be done. And the branding process had been similar in many ways: he'd done it because he has a high pain tolerance and because it's not the first magical tampering his body has been through for the sake of something greater.

Not always the greater good, but something greater.

And now this: he's been offered a one-day "Servant" to be bound to his command, in exchange for having gotten this magical symbol branded onto his body. That sure does ring a bell! . . . In a very real way, though, being somewhat familiar with the circumstances makes it all stranger, not easier.

If nothing else, there's a big difference between summoning a Servant to be your Servant, and having a friend assigned to be your servant. He can't just think of Rinea as someone to serve him! God. Do they get punished for failing at the service thing? Does going through with it feed the tattoo magic somehow? Kadoc doesn't know! This situation has very different connotations than what he's used to!

So here he is, gingerly settled under a tree in a plush patch of grass, wondering if he should have headed for a bed instead—but that would have felt really awkward. He just needs to rest for a while. Just a little while, and then he'll be fine to head home and sleep off the rest of the branding pain, without needing Rinea magically bound to tend to him . . . sheesh.

It takes him some working up to it to even "command" of her:]

I—sorry. Would you mind getting me some water? . . . That's not a magical order or anything. At least, I'm not trying to make it one.

[It probably is one anyway.]

[silvergarden]

[For her part, Rinea is quite delighted to be paired with Kadoc. She had volunteered for the role, given the priests' insistence on the ceremony's importance; besides, it was nice to feel useful. Being assigned to someone she knew and liked was simply icing on the cake.]

Of course! Please wait just a moment. [Rather than get up from her seat at his side to fetch some, Rinea pulls out her alchemy notebook and a small cup from her bag. She has magically evaporated water into the atmosphere before, so doing the reverse is but the work of a moment. (And kinetic magic helps get it all to the cup where it's supposed to be.)]

Would you like for it to be cold? [In contrast to Kadoc's hesitation, Rinea seems.... really enthusiastic, actually....]

[impostorsyndrome]

[Oh man . . . this is actually shaping up to be really cool, and at least a little of Kadoc's awkwardness melts away in favor of enjoying the alchemy show. He doesn't know many people with this brand of magic! It's easier to forget the throbbing pain spreading across his back anyway when he's got a little demonstration to watch.]

—Yeah. If that's not a huge pain or anything. . . . Thanks. How are you gonna do this?

6.

[impostorsyndrome]

[He may have explained what clubs and exotic dancing were to Rinea earlier in the month, but Kadoc has never actually been to a strip club; he's just a modern guy who knows modern media.

And if he'd ever considered going to one before, which he hasn't! but if he had! . . . he would not have expected himself to be dressed in this for the trip.

Freeze frame, zoom in, you're probably wondering how he got into this situation:

Kadoc knows well his limitations in choosing quests; he generally avoids anything involving combat. The jailbreak earlier in the month had come dangerously close to being too action-packed for his stealth mode sensibilities, even though he'd planned that out as a simple invisibility-augmented stealth mission. For that reason, he also hadn't brought backup along—and while it'd worked out in the end, he'd realized pretty quickly that he wouldn't have been able to pull it off alone with just subterfuge going for him after all. He really should be bringing combatants along on missions like these, just in case.

So he'd ended up going on this little excursion with Gareth—the kind of woman he can trust to have his back against an entire strip club if it came down to that—and Ritsuka, who, well. She's no combatant either, even if she does throw herself onto the front lines whenever she can, but Kadoc does know she's done an undercover mission or two in her time, and she has something of a way with people. Or at least with getting out of sticky situations.

It's a good team. It's just a matter of fitting in at the strip club, where Kadoc and Gareth, the illusionist and combatant, are the ones who will need to get close enough to blend in and mingle with the captive knights, and Ritsuka, the Charmer and likely distraction, will need to look more like a patron of the club . . .

And that's how things ended up like this. Ritsuka, oozing class. Gareth, whom Kadoc is making more eye contact with than he usually manages, because the prospect of accidentally making visual contact with any other part of her right now is deeply dangerous. And . . . himself, uncertain he's not going to keel over on the spot and die of embarrassment any second now.

As they squeeze into the club together, he mutters, low but loud enough for them to hear,]

If anyone tries to get me up on that stage? Just destroy the whole place before it can happen. Salt the earth.

[beaumains]

I'm not even sure I could perform that sort of dancing, as good as I am with polearms...

[ Gareth had just about as little confidence in her ability there as Kadoc did, though not to the point of wanting to simply annihilate the entire club as a result. But she definitely hoped both she and Kadoc would do enough work just looking the part, rather than being expected to act it. Or at least that Ritsuka could cover for them both. That was sort of the plan, after all.

At least, if it came down to it, she had plenty of mobility in the leotard and could throw down if she had to, but that was very much on the last resort of things. They had to identify their targets, first. ]

It's... a little hard to tell with how everyone's dressed just who has a knightly quality to them...

[fujimaru]

No one's gonna make either of you go up on stage.

[ Ritsuka, on the other hand, says it with a breezy sort of confidence. At this point, she feels pretty secure in her ability to make things up on the fly, and if it comes down to two people hiding behind her while she spins bullshit... eh. Chalk that up as something else to spin on her potential future resume.

And compared to the last time she had to dress up to go undercover? She feels a lot better. There's no Moriarty to hover weirdly or fuss with her hair; there's no weird ill-fitting grandpa suit that made her both look awful and move funny. This is the suit literally tailored for her. She knows how to move in it.

And she's reluctant to mess it up, but-- ]

Maybe we can see if we can get someone to spill something on me? Either they'll have the reflexes to miss, or they'll be apologetic without being flirty about it.

1

[groundzeroes]

Oh? It's Kadoc-kun. What a surprise.

[The smile Rei beams down at he boy isn't exactly friendly... more like he's already winding up to be amused at Kadoc's expense. Oh boy. At least that means he's open to listening to whatever is being asked of him.]

What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?

[Dramatic irony is making this hurt.]

[impostorsyndrome]

[Uuugggghhh. The truth is, he knows he needs to talk to Rei anyway about the music industry, but he's been putting it off . . . seeing him out and about during this little disaster had seemed on the surface like an easier way to approach him, but Kadoc regrets it instantly. What a fool!

He grumbles aloud in response, wordlessly. But even that grumbling sound sounds a little off. His actual reply is typed on his phone again, hastily:]

DON'T EVEN START

I KNOW YOU ALREADY HAVE BUT DON'T.

I'M TESTING SOMETHING. I'M GONNA GIVE YOU SOMEONE'S NUMBER, AND I NEED YOU TO REPEAT IT BACK TO ME.

[groundzeroes]

[WA HA, and he's already laughing at just this much. Kadoc just makes it so easy!!!]

I would ask "what do I get out of it," but I think I already have the answer. [The answer being: entertainment.]

All right, all right. [He stops himself from chuckling again, though his smile is still curled at the edges.] I'll play along, so fire away.

1 finally getting around to meeting this nerd ahhh

[hitokiri]

[ unfortunately, this might not be the help kadoc's hoping for and for once it's not because of izō's attitude getting in the way. no, he's just an animal mage so there's a possibility that kadoc might sound just fine to his ear, depending on how the magic operates... ]

Yeah? What? What's the deal with the screen?

hell yes

[impostorsyndrome]

[He is at least curious to test it out with animal mages too, just to compare, though he's not bothering to ask anyone ahead of time if they are one—first things first! Good thing he's pretty quick at typing, adding underneath that on the screen and holding it back out again:]

I NEED YOU TO TELL ME IF MY VOICE IS CURSED. I'LL SAY SOMETHING, AND YOU TELL ME WHAT YOU HEAR. THAT OKAY?

[hitokiri]

[ you'd think he'd be used to weird shit happening in general, and yet...

well, he only gives kadoc a weird look for a moment and shrugs. ]

Fine, whatever. Do whatcha gotta do.

7

[beefaroni]

[ Asterios supposes, in a way, it's nice that he can still be surprised by things. He tilts his head at the oncoming insanity, before nodding to himself and making a choice.

Seconds before Kadoc could run into him, Asterios reaches out and very casually grabs him and hoists him in the air.

He then looks at the geese parade. ]

No. Do not hurt.

[impostorsyndrome]

Hhkkkk!

[Before Kadoc realizes what's happening, he flails there in the air for a moment—but then he twists and sees who it is. Oh. Okay, cool, this is . . . probably fine? It seems fine so far! Boy did he need this moment to catch his breath after all that running.

He still has his goose, too.]

—Berserker?!

[As for the geese, they gather at his feet, honking but not attacking.]

7 - 'Helping'

[colchismagecraft]

[Medea had barely managed to avoid the many geese who'd been trying to get at her cloak- it was long and flowy and perfect for their evil beaks to try and grab at.

But it had quietened down a little bit now, enough for her to pick up some groceries and... Oh look. There was Kadoc. Being chased by a horde of furious geese.

Know what's better than 10 furious, honking geese?

10 furious, honking, cursed geese.

And so with a smirk, she concealed herself in the shadows and started to weave her dark magic- imbuing them with the fury of a dark sorceress. And, well, covering their eyes with a veil of darkness to add to the chaos. She had to give Kadoc a fighting chance, after all!]

Hahaha...~

[Only Medea would show that she cared for someone by relentlessly trolling them.]

always a helper

[impostorsyndrome]

[Ahh, he needs to rest, for just a moment, he needs to get a breath—

Kadoc ducks into an alleyway and seals it off with a transparent wall of hard light, up to the tops of the buildings he's sandwiched between. The geese will be able to fly over the partition once they realize it's open at the top, but this will slow them down enough in the meantime for Kadoc to slump over and suck in air; he leaves the "wall" clear so he can see the geese through it when they catch up.

Which they do, almost instantly, and . . . what the hell?! Did someone curse these geese?!

He stares at them, panicked, as they fling themselves against the clear light window. It's only a matter of time before they figure this out. But in the meantime, who did this?!]

Huh?!?