Festival(South)

[milicia]

(Thread for those that go to the South side. There's a parade to check out and a play and games to mess around with. The content of the games and play is up for the players to create and have with as they please.)

[alexanderthegreat]

"Oh neat, look at that!"

Alexander weaved in and out of a crowd of people gathering to watch the parade. As he tended to do, when the young king allowed himself to start having too much fun his levels of caution dropped tremendously, currently causing him to disappear not entirely out of Zeke's sight but at least a few bodies in between them. It was the usual when Alexander ventured out with his other captain (coincidentally also named Alex), though thankfully when he was with Zeke he at least seemed to subconsciously stop in his tracks now and then to seek out his other, braver half.

At least back in Santo-Luce Holmes could be assured that Alexander wouldn't get into too much trouble under Zeke's watch. Alexander right now stopped to watch a few extravagantly-dressed dancers twirl by, turning to Zeke with a big smile and saying, "It's amazing, isn't it? I could never move like that but it's always so great to watch."

[Ludro "Ace" Gamblington]

Ludro Gamblington, otherwise known as Ace, was walking in the festival, looking around and such when he noticed a shooting game, and the vast majority of prizes, including a small keg of bourbon. "I always like these games." He muttered, as he pay to play, and grinned at the dealer.
"I need at least one more person to play the game! One silver,is all I am asking to play!" The booth owner shouted.

[Zeke Omoihake]

Zeke too was caught up in the dazzling spectacle before them, watching the lights flicker up to the sky from the hands of the marching mages before bursting brilliantly in the air. Seeing Queen Milicia he caught her gaze for only a moment, and waved shyly.

"You know, I wonder if she recognizes me with the beard and armor? I don't look that different do I Alex?" Zeke turned his neck back to get his king's opinion. Realizing the king had slipped away on him he rolled his eyes. "Not again." He groaned as he sifted past a few bodies before coming up behind Alex. Watching him stare at the lovely dancers Zeke raised his hand up and gave him a light bonk on the head.

"Wandering legs and wandering eyes? Not a good combination for a king eh sire?" Zeke spoke with a mischievous grin that did a fine enough job hiding the slight bit of jealousy that had come out in him.

[alexanderthegreat]

"Agh, I'm sorry, it's just--wait, what do you mean by 'wandering eyes'?!" the flustered king spat. No, really, what did he mean? Of course his attention was divided, there was so much to look at. He didn't see what was wrong with that, though...aw hell, he didn't get it.

"Alright then, what is a better combination for a king then? Please enlighten me," Alexander quickly carried the conversation along, throwing an arm around Zeke with a grin and looking back out to the parade.

[Zeke Omoihake]

"Hmm, good question. Charm, good public speaking, dashing good looks..." Zeke sent him a smirk and a sideways glance. "Well, I guess 3 for 3 is a pretty good record so I'll let you slide this time. Now come on, let's see if sporting loser fits you too as I kick your butt at some of these festival games."

Zeke headed down the fairway, glancing to the left and right as he strolled past each vendor. There were a lot of the same games that Zeke had seen at the Black Rose Festival last year, and he wondered briefly if the same people had helped set up this festival too. Moving past a small group of people huddled around card games Zeke moved into a large open space where people were taking shots at a moving bullseye.

"Well Alex maybe I'll start off easy on you, and we'll pick something we're each equally bad at."

"Hey there, just a silver coin and you get three shots. Knock down the target and you win a free leg of lamb at Mobi's Shop o' Shanks." The booth worker barely lifted his head as he spoke the memorized line in a droll tone.

[alexanderthegreat]

"Flattery will get you everywhere with me, Zeke," Alexander grinned, rubbing the other man's back and adding with a wink, "but you have to remember that every good king still needs his complement. Good thing I have you, huh?"

He'd raised an eyebrow at the other man's competitive side and eagerness to play a game or two. Alexander followed along but was usually never one for playing the games in festivals personally. They were usually fun to watch at least.

As they got closer to the target-knocking game Alexander's facial expression twisted to something slightly disgusted as he said, "Ew. You really want me to touch that?"

His need for fun and entertainment was what would make him play of course as always, but his snobbish and regal upbringing was what made him give the filthy shots, targets, even the guy running the whole booth an odd and hesitant stare.

"Well Zeke, seeing as how you are very insistent that I'll lose," Alexander started, trying to quickly diminish his snooty remark just moments ago, "how about we make this interesting? We'll see who can win the most games on this little adventure of ours and the one who loses the most has to do whatever the winner wants them to for the rest of the day."

[Zeke Omoihake]

"Hmm, so if I win you have to do anything I say, and if I lose I only have to do what my job asks of me? How can I lose?" He said as he flipped a silver into the outstretched hand of the apathetic booth operator. The gangly man bent down and pulled out a set of three corked arrows and with a yawn waved Zeke away towards a stand of bows.

Zeke knocked the first arrow and drew the string back slowly. With only his right eye opened he watched the target run its circuit and just when it reached the middle he released the string. With a sharp whistle the arrow sailed true.

Too bad "true" was a good meter away from where the target was. Zeke sighed a deep breath as the second arrow drew back against the taut string. Trying his same strategy he tried to line up his shot for where it would be and not where it was. Just like Space Invaders. The thought put a smile on his face as he fired off the second shot, sending it just shy of where the target had been.

As Zeke pulled the last arrow back, he noticed something special. The target halted to a stop for just a moment right when it reached the very end of its path and right before it began to go back the way it came. Deciding to take his chance on the laziness of the operator Zeke waited for the target to reach the apex of its movement before sending the arrow out. Proving his guess the arrow struck the still target and caused it to drop. Zeke gave a joyful fist pump as he walked over to Alex and held the bow out for him.

"Your turn Alex." He gave him a wink back before turning to the target to watch.

[alexanderthegreat]

Alexander couldn't hide the large grin on his face as Zeke accepted the 'challenge'. Where Alexander wasn't entirely inept at playing lousy festival games, he certainly had never honestly cared enough about them to really become good at them.

Despite him having a few difficulties, he clapped approvingly as Zeke knocked the target over, the fist pumping action as always amused him. Alexander took the bow from Zeke and didn't waste much time getting his shot ready, pulling the string back tightly and he watched the targets move. He thought he'd heard a snickering coming from the man in the booth though he shrugged it off and steadily aimed and fired the corked arrow.

It missed the target, though only barely. He heard the snickering again which confirmed to Alexander that the man had indeed been making fun of him at least a little; he related it to his comment about how unsanitary this thing was as when he said it it had been pretty loud.

Alexander got his second shot ready but let himself get too distracted with what the booth guy was doing to aim it anything close to properly. He let go too early and it went sailing into a support that was holding up a shelf with what looked to be housing a variety of prizes. It shook the whole shelf, the support seemed to be loose. Startling the booth worker he spat out some comment along the lines of "hey kid, watch where you're shooting" before resting his lazy self back against the wall under the shelf. Alexander bit his lip frustratedly, more at himself than anything and prepared his final shot.

Alexander felt confident with this last one for sure--he'd felt fairly confident throughout really, he wasn't bad at this thing. Even with that lazy jerk on the side giving him a funny look and eagerly waiting for him to fail Alexander felt good.
Before firing he turned the bow off a little ways to the side again and his last, very powerful shot took itself back into the support on the shelf, it coming loose entirely and the shelf falling on top of the man standing under it.

People walking by stopped, stared, some laughed and Alexander looked into the debris of wood, some glass, and stuffed things and said only a little too simply, "oops."

[Zeke Omoihake]

Zeke's eyes widened with surprise as he looked from Alex to the booth before he decided that someone had to help the guy get out from the rubble. Sliding himself under the cracked support beam he shoved his back into it with a grunt. Though he only managed to raise it a foot or so, it was enough for the skinny booth worker to escape through the opening.

The man had barely even wiped the dirt from his clothes before he was marching up to Alex lipping off about "how dare you..." and "just you wait...". He was just about to finish a particularly vivid explanation of where his boss' foot was going to go after he saw the booth, when he felt Zeke's hand grasp hold of the neck of his tunic as he pulled him back.

Though Zeke lacked the intimidating stature or armour to scare off the man by looks alone, the blade at his hip and the unyielding grip on the guy's shirt seemed enough to silence him for a moment. Zeke reached into a pouch on his belt and stuffed a few silver coins into his hand. With a quaint smile he said, "That will be enough." before he let the man go.

He didn't know for sure whether Alex had meant to do what he did. The shot, if intentional was about as good as his had been with the target itself. With the booth worker paid off and left to shoot him a dirty look Zeke moved to Alex and gestured him to get out of there.

"Was that really necessary?" Zeke asked, testing if his guess was right.

[alexanderthegreat]

Alexander seemed pretty unafraid of anything that was coming his way even though he did flinch only slightly at the booth worker coming at him. With the man paid off Alexander took off with Zeke, finding himself unable to answer the question promptly delivered to him with much of a grin.

"...well, really it wasn't supposed to land on him, it was just supposed to fall in general," he admitted slowly, trying to replay things out in his mind, "he just didn't move like he should have..."

He smiled then and shrugged as he quickly threw in, "Does it really matter, though? You won that one! Good job!"

[cloaked]

From the eastern side of the parade came a cacophony of terror as people seemed to be fleeing towards the festival's gaming area. "We're being attacked!" Some cried as they ran past the booths, hoping to escape whatever was happening.

The source of which was a group of four warriors garbed in the dark green crested armour of Ariadelvento. With a hauntingly blank expression on their faces they cut swathes of people down as they rushed through the crowds. While two of them took the lead with a dagger and short sword, the pair behind them threw out their grapnel hooks to the roofs of a couple taller stone buildings and began to fire arrows seemingly at random towards civilians.

[Zeke Omoihake]

The chaos caused Zeke to leap instinctively inbetween Alex and the source of the danger. Drawing his blade he held an arm out infront of his king. "Stay behind me Alex!" Zeke looked around for anything that could offer some shelter. With only a brief smile at the irony of it all, Zeke noticed the booth Alex had toppled provided a pretty solid bit of cover.

Motioning towards it he tried to guide him over to it, and when they got close enough Zeke moved beneath the same beam he had pushed to get the worker out, and heaving once more upwards he lifted it up enough to fit Alex's slender frame.

"Get inside. You'll be safe in here." He jerked his head towards the opening, hoping that Alex would not stop to argue with him. Zeke's eyes could not help but wander towards the source of the danger as the drive he had possessed as a Hero seemed to have awaken after the year long slumber. He wanted to get out there and fight, yet his obligation and his love towards Alex kept him in place...for now.

[alexanderthegreat]

'What in the...'

Alexander's thoughts wandered as his eyes widened. He hadn't seen much but he could see a lot of red to accompany the cries and screams of the innocent people who'd been only moments ago enjoying the festival. He probably wouldn't have even had a clue how to react to the commotion if it wasn't for Zeke already moving him along, not that he seemed to be giving Alexander much choice in the matter right now anyway.

"Whoa. You're not serious, are you?" he said, giving the beam that Zeke lifted now for him a skeptical look, "and what about you?! I don't want you out here doing something stupid, Zeke!"

Because you know Alexander wasn't going to make any of this easy for Zeke. He couldn't imagine what would happen if he came out of this only to find him dead afterall, the added fact that they didn't even know who or what exactly the enemy was didn't make it any better.

[Zeke Omoihake]

"I said get inside!" Zeke shouted, perhaps overreacting a bit as this was the first real emergency he had encountered since he had joined the Santo-Lucian army. "I can't protect you while I'm holding this beam up!"

Zeke's eyes kept darting up and around, looking for anything suspicious that might come at them. So far the area was almost flooded with people. Luckily most seemed too busy just running away to bother seeing the potential hiding spot he was offering Alex. The last thing he needed was a horde of civilians trying to crowd the already tiny space to save their own skins.

The sooner I can get him in here, the sooner I can help everybody. His mind nagged him over and over again. The Hero in him had indeed taken hold over his duty, as he felt the call to battle pulling inside him.