Birthday Party

[peripheries]

Who: Paul Atreides and all his CR
What: Throwing everyone’s favorite Duke a surprise birthday party
When: Forwarded dated to April 1st
Where: Bone House in Gaze

Content Warnings: Drinking, underage drinking, drugs (both fictional and not), drawings of space worms, skeletons, will add further warnings if necessary



When you arrive at the house in Gaze, (affectionately known as Bone House), a skeleton will open the door and offer to take your coat if you have one. No need to take your shoes off or anything!

The large house has been decorated with black streamers and confetti. In the entryway and hung on the railing to the second floor that overlooks the entrance to the great room are large banners that say “HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAUL” (though one looks like it used to say “Jaune” but was just painted over? Whatever).

In the Living Room, there is a large board and various colored markers for people to write messages to the birthday boy. There is also a table full of bottled water and various couches, chairs, and beanbags to collapse into if the party gets to be too much and one needs a quiet place to rest or a place to chill if you’ve imbibed too much… well, whatever you had.

It is also where all the food and drinks are.

There’s an extremely large charcuterie board with the usual meats, cheeses, and olives as well as an extremely eccentric collection of snacks ranging from individual sized Cheez-it bags, to humungous bags of Doritos and salty chips, as well as nearly every kind of Oreo one can imagine.

There are also various cakes, all angel food. Some are misshapen, some have an attempt at being frosted with whipped cream and fruit, one even says “Happy Birthday Ka-” before that was hastily covered with a bunch of strawberries jammed really close together.

At the island, a skeleton is playing bartender. Surprisingly, it can seem to take and understand individual orders, but there’s always a constant flow of tequila shots being made and sent out to the great hall to be served by another skeleton.

And, no, of course it’s not going to check your age to see if you’re legal. It’s a skeleton. Why would it care?

The Great Hall is the center of activity and where everyone is encouraged to mingle and have fun. There is a skeleton on the grand piano in the corner gleefully playing piano covers of the hits from the Shrek Soundtrack with the occasional cover of “DaRude’s Sandstorm” when it has another one to help out.

In another corner, on huge piece of paper that spans nearly 6ft wide and 8ft tall is drawing of an Arrakis sandworm and it’s giant maw. The game is Pin the Tooth on the Sandworm and it’s… very easy… because the worm maw is most of the board. Even if the skeleton spins you as you’re blindfolded, it’s pretty hard to lose. If you manage to do it, which is likely, the skeleton running the game will award you a tequila shot! If you lose, the skeletons will award you a tequila shot (but it’s rail).

(It’s a drinking game, isn’t the point to drink?)

There’s also a table that has many candelabras on it, numbering up to seventeen. They’re still lit and burning even though there is a sign that says “make a wish!” even though it almost looks like a shrine for the dead.

…It’s maybe clear that the concept of “birthday candles” was greatly misunderstood.

There is also a skeleton dealing out small doses of “Spice”, a psychoactive drug straight outta the Duneverse. However, you must check in with this Skeleton to get a dose. There will be no “permanently melting your brain with ancestral memories” at this party!

Teacher’s/God’s/Jod’s/The Emperor Undying’s study, adjacent to the main hall, is closed and locked. Though, the lock is fairly easy to break if someone really wanted to get in. There’s not even skeletons guarding.

That said, many things are warded with eerie runes of blood and bone.

So, fuck around and find out.

The upstairs is generally off limits. Party goers can climb up the stairs, and it’s encouraged if they want to look over the Great Room from above, but all of the bedrooms are carefully guarded by more skeletons who will SCREAM VERY LOUDLY if you try to enter and will become hostile if done by force.

Of course, this won’t happen if you are with someone who lives in the house.

Enjoy the party! Mingle away!

((ooc: if you have any questions or anything, please hit me up at worldtype)) or via PM.))

Birthday Board | At the Party | The Morning After | IC Party Games | Spice Dealer

Comments

[hearthebell]

L's glance is brief and furtive.

"It's never actually weird if people stop talking to me."

And maybe he does that on purpose, maybe he just accepts it as something that is likely or inevitable given his particular predilections and tendencies.

"Don't you know? I mean the outcome that is... right, or righteous. The one that benefits the most people at the least cost.Don't you share this definition?"

[wannasmash]

He will accept a wide range of weird, and has done so throughout his life. Still, he's someone who knows what it's like to be isolated, though not extremely. He was picked on and had no friends in junior high. It was lonely, existing right next to what he could be doing, overhearing conversations about karaoke or arcades after school. He threw himself into solitary pursuits instead and eked out his own corner of happiness.

Even now, having gotten past most of that, he can't fully grasp the effect this had on him--the bouts of shyness, floundering in social situations, or giving full rein to the admiration he feels for his friends because he treasures what he has now compared to what he didn't have before. It hasn't been long enough. He hasn't seen enough--though he's seen plenty of the world so far.

It's the old question about cost. Does he aim a trolley at one person to avoid hitting many? He's faced a version of this before. He was lucky--or very clever--to have found a solution then.

"It can mean different things to different people, so I wanted to ask. I know sometimes there's costs, but I would like to save everyone if I can."

He's a little quieter than the energy he was known for, but the young man who kicked open a door with feral intensity is no less polite or sincere than usual.

[hearthebell]

There are many ways the two of them are alike that they are aware of, and some that perhaps have not yet come to perfect light. L's dark grey eyes glance away, and he is momentarily silent and pensive in response to Deku's words.

"What if what you would 'like' isn't possible, and never will be, and you know that from a very early age? How do you act then?"

[wannasmash]

Midoriya knew just one thing like that from an early age. His shoulders rise slightly and self-consciously. He highly doubts Paul or anyone else would have said anything. The half-truth Midoriya told a handful of people isn't a dangerous secret, but it's personal. The full truth is something Midoriya (to his knowledge) has only told one person, and that person closed it up safe like a steel trap, inexorable as a wolf's bite.

"I did grow up thinking something wouldn't be possible, but always kind of hoping... I learned it was an impossible hope--but then I was proven wrong anyway." His eyebrows rise a little, indicating pleasant surprise. "I guess... there's things we just don't know and can't account for. Can't hurt to try, even if something I want is hard."

It's what he's always said. Now he adds something new, eyes flicking down, voice much quieter,

"Even if I fail."