Colors of Remnant

Castor always figured the worst punishment he could ever receive was extra assignments, classes, and maybe a few days of detention. Never in his wildest dreams could he imagine the people at Beacon would force upon him the cruelest punishment yet...community service. According to his would-be wardens, the local festivals were starting. From what little he remembers, it seemed to be a yearly thing where for the next month or so Vale would be celebrating....something? The pictures and videos they showed his class seems like the whole event was an excuse to eat, drink, and party. Which usually Castor was all for, booze and food was always a good thing.

However, his professors made it clear that Castor would have to participate regardless as his class attendance earlier the semester had put him at risk of expulsion. Castor begrudgingly accepted asking if he could at least participate in activities like a normal student after his day of "work" was done. They obliged him, after all, Castor was a delinquent but he had the same right to enjoy himself as the rest of the students. As long as he behaved himself that is...with them making it very clear that they would keep an eye on him.

He had half expected some half-assed carnival fair, after all from what he heard from the other volunteers not many people bother with these festivals. Anyone who was old enough usually spent their time either at clubs, bars, or other places that held their special events. Kids loved the events for the free candy, and the unfortunate teenagers forced to babysit them could use the free costumes to hid their embarrassment. The worst part of this was when he found out the event was one hundred percent dry...as in no booze, wine, or even spirits to keep his spirit up.

When he had finally arrived at the Carnival grounds, however, Castor was taken by surprise. What he thought would be some kind of graveyard of poorly put together stands with barely a soul in sight, ended up being a large wall in the shape of a clown's...mouth that separated the event area from the rest of the city. The entrance was so packed that there was a line spanning several blocks just to get in. Since it was technically working the event Castor skipped line much to the irritation many of the people were giving him.

"Imagine having the pay to go to this?" , he said, gloating it over the crowd, Castor revealed in all the stupid mugs and daggers they stared at him. Not like he had friends in the city or Beacon so Castor figured to make the most of his free time. Once he went inside Castor's eyes gleamed with aww at all the stands and people around, he had never been in such a packed area in his whole life. He then realized each of the stands had a strange clown person at them, was it some kind of uniform he thought? It didn't take long for one of the other staff members a professor given their stature...they explained that the masks were optional and the only real part of the uniform required would be the small vests the volunteers would wear.

The mask in question was bone-white with a strange smile, and two horns on top of its head like a crown, the vest in question bore the same shade of red as the host of the event's clothes. Once he was given the uniform, the professor in question instructed him to head towards the pie-eating contest as they were short-staffed. Apparently... a rooster was participating and was eating the pies faster than the staff could make them.

Castor knew "participating" wasn't the right word to describe it, after all he knew of one particularly foul...fowl who fit the bill. When he finally arrived to the location his little theory was confirmed. It wasn't that the carnival was letting the little shit participate, it was that none of the staff could get the thing to go away. He couldn't help but laugh to himself as the large black feathered rooster, who was almost the size of a dog was casually enjoying his meal of an ill gotten pie...said pie was still screaming it figurative lungs out. All the while four of the staff members, all wearing the same clown masks slowly tried to approach it.

The fowl in question was the pet of a mama Brigette, a part time bar owner, crime boss of Vale and friends to his mentor Set? but that was a story for another day,

They would all try to jump at the bird at the same time, hoping to catch it.

Castor knew it wasn't going to work, "Kriminel" after all was able to use aura. Which is quickly demonstrated as it leaped high into the air like a rocket with a piece of pie between it's beaks. Before anyone else could make any further moves on it, it dashes through the crowds and headed away from the people chasing after it and headed towards the Emerald forest.

Wasn't there some kind of event happening there? Castor paused for a moment before deciding not to go after the bird, last time he tried chasing the little bastard, it almost took an eye out. Besides it's trained to kill Grimm so it should be fine ? Castor's mind went back to reality when he realized Kriminel's destruction left the pie station ruined, covered both in pie and bird shit.

Castor cursed under his breath realizing he would be forced to clean up after it, "oh I'm so going to tell on your mama for this" he thought to himself, wondering what other crazy shenanigan's that bird was going to get up to tonight.

The queue to enter the carnival had been a blur for Keid, excited as he was for the whole event. He hadn't payed much attention to the many clones of the organizer manning every stall and the entrance. Maybe he should have, he thought as he only now read the eclectic list he'd been handed.
After sampling as many dishes as he could from the food stalls, he'd come right to the Dust-pie eating contest with the obvious intent to taste some of the pies. Instead, he stumbled upon what he thought was a performance at first, four of the strangely dressed staff chasing an impressively large bird - which nearly bowled Keid over when it flew away. All of it had been a bit too sudden for him to think about marking the bird.

There was a momentary silence where everyone processed the chaotic mess left in its wake. "That happen often?", Keid blurted out to the Sliver Shiver(s?). Assuming they were going to need help before the contest could resume, he carefully stepped over crushed pies, put down all of his food samples on a table and readjusted his costume.

It wasn't the most practical outfit, the main reason being the large cardboard Deathstalker head covering his abdomen. The idea was to position it over some of Keid's photophores to make the red 'eyes' glow faintly. To go with it, he wore a black ensemble underneath with the sleeves extending into makeshift pincers, his face painted black and finally, blond hair shaped like a stinger by an ungodly amount of gel.

A masked man stood to his feet as he watched the commotion a single bird was making over at the eating competition, and he watched as four staff me ever failed to keep it in check before it took off with incredible speed, far faster than he presumed the fowl could be capable of. He held a red gloved hand forward with his palm facing outwards at the fowl, a red glass arrow began to form in front of it. Rouge was hopping to either shoot in front of it with hopes to have it fly back in terror, or to hit an extremity to maybe slow it down. Before he could choose a target a kid grabbed onto the silver robe, decorated with ruby vines and roses which gave the robe a resemblance to an ashen field. The kid pulled hard onto the sleeve which threw off his aim so bad that the arrow went flying to a stack of cups, making whoever was lucky enough to play win and a confused staff meme we who was working with his back turned away. The kid looked up at Rouge and smirked before, having a long talk with him and asking him so many questions, walking away with Rouge’s Cotten candy.

The musician, for the first time in a long while was seen without any kind of instrument, walked towards the mess of the eating contest and stopped at the edge. Wondering what he could do to help, until he looked over and saw what seems to be one of Beacon’s forced volunteer students. He’s heard about a few select students who were forced to attend this festival to help and possibly make them learn something. Rouge wasn’t sure if it was a real thing until he saw the student in plain view. When he was near the student he heard him say something quiet but didn’t really catch it. ”This is quite a mess, it’s very unfortunate this had to happen.” He spoke with a tone that very much sounded monotonous and with the mask over his face, it didn’t help. The mask in questions was something Rouge had to commission a few weeks ago from an armor, just like his current robes, it was silver just like his robes but the mask adorned red markings that ran down through both eye sockets. There was no mouth hole but there was a set of carved teeth that were as vicious and furious as any Grimm. This year Rouge was entering the costume contest, and hopefully win it.

People have easily come to the conclusion the masked man was Rouge because of severa key giveaways. One being the robes were almost a complete copy of his normal set, and the voice whenever he talked to some of the students he knows. Though with the help of his semblance, long red claws were at his fingertips and claws sprouted from his shoes, and glass needs wrapped around his arms which helped him not be so obvious to his friends.

Unsurprisingly the little bastard made a mess but Castor couldn't help but find the whole thing entertaining on multiple levels, regardless the bird shouldn't cause any problems unless someone is stupid enough to provoke it. It didn't take long for the things to return to normal...or as normal a weird event like this can be. A student in a costume was asking the many Slivers, but Castor quickly responded "more than you think, but less than I hope, but then again it ain't every day you see an animal use aura." To him, the bird was someone he meet on a semi-regular basis either if it was looking for something or if the bird needed him for any special errands.

But enough about that Castor figured it wasn't worth the effort to bother with Kriminel for at least one night, noticing the student's costume "nice Grimm choice." If he wasn't stuck cleaning up and working Castor figured he would have had time to make a costume himself...granted he wouldn't even know where to begin. Soon after another person spoke up, this new person had a much more complex attire than the first one. Though as usual Castor let his opinion be known in his special way.

"Nah it's fine, worse thing is someone got bird shit in their pie, and maybe their eyes too, but that's why soap exists." He didn't look behind himself to feel the collective animosity the rest of the student volunteers were directing towards him. Not like he cared for any of them, if anything he sort of feed off that hate. It made messing with them all the more fun.

Right after that one of the Slivers approached him claiming they needed more help at the costume contest area something about one of the judges getting sick from one the pie or something. Castor shrugged and accepted his new burden of the night, "since we're all headed in the same direction might as well go as a group?"

Keid turned to come face to face with two... people? He'd paused earlier at the outfit of the tall masked man, even more impressive now without cotton candy clashing with the costume. Those red claws were particularly well-made. Keid had gotten a first guess at their personalities when his fellow student just watched the scene unfold with crossed arms and a laugh, and the disguised man tried to outright impale the bird with a projectile... Though since it could apparently use Aura, it might have survived if hit.

"Thanks", Keid took the compliment on his costume with a smile, "I've never met one like that, but I'm told they're native to Vale and quite scary." He turned to the clawed man and gestured at his whole figure: "Hey, tell me, what inspired all that?"

He didn't have time to dwell on the answer however, as the shorter student purposefully angered the whole crowd. Keid was willing to help at first — or well, at second, since he came for the pies — but he quickly faltered under the frowns earned by the crude remark. "Um... maybe you shouldn't have voiced that thought. Are you really a volunteer? 'Cause you don't sound very voluntary", Keid cringed and put a hand on the guy's shoulder before speaking up to the offended group. "It's just a joke, don't take it personally!", he waved off with a fake laugh, accepting the easy way out of the whole situation with only a bit of guilt. The staff already had help to clean up, they could do without them.

Rouge stood stoic behind the mask as he thought of what to do next. First was possibly going after the bird and dealing with it in some capacity. Second was to help out here and possibly assist the possible traumatized pie eater. Third was to walk away and act like he wasn’t here to begin with. Rouge certainly liked option number three but that was taken away from him as two students came to him for conversation, not that he minded. Gripping the mask, Rouge raised it over his head to reveal mark free face to the new companions.

When the volunteer spoke of possible scenarios it didn’t really inspire a vote of confidence in Rouge, and making him question if this student really was a volunteer or just playing a con in some capacity. Though he wasn’t really going to let this guy go off on his own to help out sick judges. ”If you consider that is the worst possible scenario, than maybe we shouldn’t let it get to that point.” Rouge adjusted his robe slightly, the glittering glass shifted and blinked brightly as they reflected the colorful lights, and tied his signature sash tighter around his waist.

The musician caught the other student’s question about his outfit as he made the small adjustments, unsure of how to answer it. It was based off of his usual combat attire but as if his glass began to take over and turn to the darkness. Even his mask was a Grimm mask with his glass pouring from its open eyes and through the fang carvings. ”Im not sure where to specifics came, but one day a friend told me a nightmare she had of a Grimm covered in blood and glass shards. But it still came after her. So I guess it came from that.”

Seeing the costume the first person Castor realized he also had yet to encounter a deathstalker yet, from what he had been told it usually takes a whole team of huntsman to kill just one of them. When his commentary had gotten from the usual reaction Castor clarified his position within the staffing "Volunteer, prisoner, same thing if you think about it. Especially the part where I don't get paid either way." He didn't feel any sense of guilt from his words after all the other students would have left him to clean the mess on his own if they could, after all, many of them were in the same position he was. Either forced to work due to poor grades or other reasons.

"if it gets to that point all it does is prove they aren't huntsman material." his harsh word was a lot less playful than before, out in the wild once mistake and you're as good as dead. Though that bird is probably scarier than most Grimm so maybe he should cut them some slack? Listening to the second student's costume made Castor wonder if Grimm even bleed like normal animals or people?

It wouldn't be long till they reached the contest area, "the name's Castor by the way" he said introducing himself casually. Once introductions would split up as the moment they arrived at their destination one of the other Sliver ran up to them, rushing the two costume guests to their back of the stage with the rest of the contestants and Castor towards the judge's table. They needed at least one of the judges to have a simple perspective for the competitions for some bizarre reason?

Keid was expecting something more abstract, and maybe less ominous as an explanation for the impressive costume. He let out a low whistle when he tried to picture the nightmare. With closer inspection, the pieces of glinting material seemed to really be made of glass or crystal. "You tried to fight in that? Weren't you afraid to break it?", Keid asked still trying to examine the glinting material.

He was less enthusiast about the shorter guy's brand of snark. Normally he wouldn't mind, but his comments all sounding slightly negative was becoming unpleasant. "Seems to me like you're free to go wherever", Keid retorted to the complaint about his job. "And you might berate them for not being up to standards, but you didn't do anything to prevent it either", he completed pointing to the volunteers they'd left behind. Faulting people was not in his habits however, so he sighed and came back to a more friendly tone to give his name as well.
"I'm Keid, it's nice to meet you but... it'd be nicer if you were in a better mood?", Keid cringed at the wording. "I mean, try to look at the bright side of things. And we'll catch up later apparently", he finished when a staff member ushered him and his shiny companion away from Castor.