It's Curtains Act 2 Test Drive

[stagemanagers]

1) CURTAINS UP

You’ve just woken up in a small dressing room, which is certainly not where you went to bed last night. Actually, do you even remember going to sleep…? Regardless, this isn't where you last were, and if you leave your room you’re going to find a lot of other people in the same state.

Go out and socialize! Most of these people may be strangers, but you’re gonna all have to get used to one another. And who knows? There may actually be a familiar face in the crowd.

2) THIS PETTY PACE

By now, you're acquainted with everybody here and you're slowly growing bored. Bored enough to kill? Hopefully not. You'd better try to find something else to do. You can always go hang out with your castmates, or maybe try and whip something up in the kitchen! There’s also a music room to keep you busy! I sure hope you like music.

3) BREAK A LEG

Comedies are fun and all, but that’s not quite what we’re about here. You’ve all just been handed this week’s motive. What do you make of it? Is it one that might actually tempt you to kill, or did you get off lightly this time? Either way, maybe you’d better look around the room and see who else is having a rough time.

4) CURTAIN

It was bound to happen eventually. Someone is dead, and now it's time to go off and investigate. Were they close to you? Are you, perhaps, feeling guilty? Either way, it's probably best not to leave anyone alone right now.

5) CUE MUSIC

Feelings in a murder-opera can get pretty gosh darn intense. Sometimes you’ve just got to let it out. And hey, if you sing a song about whatever’s going on in your head, maybe someone will hear and come help you? Either way, this is a musical – there’s not really any reason not to sing.

[Mod Note: The song mechanic is meant to be fluid and simple. You do not have to produce your own song lyrics, nor are you required to use show tunes (although we do encourage it!). If you want to rewrite existing lyrics to fit the situation, go for it! Anything goes - if Mumford and Sons expresses your character’s current emotions, then break out the banjos. We want to keep the musical mechanic as fun and simple as we can to encourage our players to use it as much as they like.]

6) WILDCARD

Make up your own prompt!

--

Questions, comments, concerned? Reach the mods on plurk at slothbless (Lynny) and lluosogrwydd (Lu) and at our public mod plurk stagemanagers. Our official Act 2 FAQ can also be found here!

Comments

Steven Universe | Gay Space Rocks

[holyspit]

1. Curtains Up
Hello? Pearl, Amethyst, anyone?

[This is almost certainly not part of the temple, or at least no part of it Steven's ever seen. Not any part of Beach City he's ever been too, either. Jaime would probably kill for access to a theater this nice- or, well. Monologue dramatically about grappling with an inner demon pushing him to kill, more likely.]

Okay... at least this seems nicer than most other kidnappings? Is it bad I can make that comparison?

2. This Petty Pace
[It's become clear none of them are getting out of here anytime soon. That's fine! Everything is fine. Steven is currently in the kitchen, because sure his powers are gone and they're all trapped and being told to kill but he can still cook and that's a way to help at least a little so he's not totally worthless! It's fine.]

I think it's done!

[Sweating and flour-stained, Steven carefully removes a large pan from the sweltering oven and places it on the counter.]

[It's- that sure does look like a stack of pizzas.]

I call it pizza cake. Sweet and savory have been at war too long. What do you think?

4. Curtain
No, no no no no-!

[Steven's seen death before. But one this violent? That's new.]

[Which may be why he's sobbing over the body of Alonso Quijano, the Knight Errant.]

[The stranger part is that while he's wiping up his tears, he's actively trying to scrub them into the old man's skin.]

Come on, come on, work! Do something!

5. Cue Music
[Heck yeah Steven's spending time in the music room, it's been to long since he was able to just kick back and jam. Pity it took a kidnapping for it to happen, but. Details.]

[He has a guitar and things are, relatively, actually and unironically fine for a few minutes.]

Pressure! Pushing down on me,
pressing down on you, no one asked for.
Under pressure, burning us up inside,
Splits our friendships in two,
Puts lives on the line.

[Mostly fine. Probably.]

6. Wildcard
[You know what this is.]

5

[mcfife]

[Angus McFife leans against the wall, restless and frustrated at how powerless he - the prince who lead armies and fought demons alone - was to prevent these deaths. With the limits to his power and abilities, the fire of his heart is weakened while the danger around him grows. Only the gods know what his breaking point is.

The calming guitar quells the rage within, but even he cannot help but add his own thoughts.]

It's the helpless sensation of this murderous trend
Watching some good friends cry
"Will this end?"
Pray tomorrow gets me higher
Pressure on people, putting lives on the line

[...His vocals are a bit growly and on the louder side, but he's trying to be softer.]

[holyspit]

[Being soft might be hard, this is the part that starts kicking up the barely repressed rage.]

Whoa-oh-OH-oh!
We'll be okay.
Whoa-oh-oh,
We'll be, someday.
Motives abound, kick our hopes to the floor,
Do as they say to get out, the producers they roar!

[mcfife]

[Angus hums to guitar as Steven sings along and steps away from the wall. He takes hold of a microphone just lying around in the room.]

It's the helpless sensation of this murderous trend
Watching some good friends cry
"Will this end?"

[With a quick flourish, he pulls the mike to his face, his hand outstretched before him, and raises his voice.]

Pray tomorrow gets me higher, high!
Pressure on people, putting lives on the line

Pretended it was fine for a moment
Confronted motives, it don't work
Keep coming up with hope but it's so slashed and torn
Why, why, whyyyyyyy?

[He belts a high pitch note on the last word.]

[holyspit]

Stage managers laugh, under pressure we're breaking!

Can't we give ourselves one more chance?
Why can't we give hope that one more chance?

[Just lost in the sauce music.]

[mcfife]

Why can't we give hope, give hope, give hope, give hope, give hope, give hope, give hope, give hope, give hope?

'Cause hope's an old word from the past,
And hope dares you to care for the people without fear of the night,
And hope dares you to change our way of protecting ourselves.
This is our last scene.
This is our last scene.
This is ourselves.

[holyspit]

I guess it's curtains.
This might be curtains.

[That got a little depressing at the end, but hopefully it was more cathartic than anything else.]

[Steven plucks a last few notes on the guitar, letting the sound strum out into space.]

[mcfife]

[Angus stares at his loosely clenched fist for some time after Steven finishes his song. It was helpful, getting those emotions out there (especially with the part where he could sort-of scream), though they have returned to this world of chaos and murder.]

This has gone for far too long.

2

[recessives]

[ Shilo sort of. Blinks as she looks at it. Do either of these foods exist in the nightmare future? I'm not sure! Food that's not like GeneCo Brand Prepared Nutrition Slurry is probably for the rich. ]

I mean... I've never had pizza or cake, but probably?

[holyspit]

[Steven pauses in the middle of getting what could be a worryingly large knife to attempt cutting his creation and looks at Shilo with an expression of mingled horror and pity.]

That is- ...okay, not the SADDEST thing I've ever heard, but pretty close.

[Definitely in the top ten or twenty or so.]

But that's the good news! You get to try both at once now, sort of.

[He's cutting his culinary monstrosity. It's oozing cheese and tomato sauce, a bit.]

...This is more pizza than cake, but it's a first attempt.

[recessives]

[ Oh just wait until you hear about her "having ever seen the sun" status, Steven! ]

And pizza is... the savory one?

[ Flipped a real life coin for her guess, lads. ]

[holyspit]

Right! It's usually made with cheese and meats and other stuff over tomato sauce and a crust.

[This is- kind of a big stack of deep dish pizzas, honestly.]

For this I mixed in some- I think it was goat cheese? And gouda, sweeter stuff, with the usual mozzarella, and there's fruit in the toppings.

[How prepared is Shilo for pineapple on pizza, cause that's a thing.]

[recessives]

I've heard about it, but... there's not exactly a lot of non-prepared food to go around where I'm from.

[ God explaining repo! world shit just even depresses her... And she's never had anything on pizza so pineapple might as well happen!!

She gives it a taste!!! Contemplates it. ]

Well... it's not my favorite thing I've had here, but I don't dislike it?

[ Flavors..... are good. ]

[holyspit]

[That's good, cause there's a lot of flavors here.]

[Steven cuts another dripping slice and puts it on a plate for himself.]

It's a first attempt! I can make it better. Probably.

[recessives]

[ She takes another bite. ]

I'm not exactly going to be much help on how to change it, sorry. Being sick all the time doesn't leave you with a lot of experience when it comes to different kinds of food, it's just... lots of sandwiches and soup and vitamins.

4

[nobodysbismuth]

Steven? Woah, hey -

[Bismuth enters and strides forward quickly, enough to see the body fairly fast.]

Stars...hey, c'mon. There's nothin' you can do now.

[holyspit]

I CAN FIX THIS!

[He'd fixed Lars, more or less, Alonso or Don Quixote or whatever his name was almost definitely wouldn't mind being pink. If he even noticed.]

Please, I just- if my powers would just stop BEING USELESS-

[nobodysbismuth]

Hey, hey.

[She takes a knee next to him, resting a big hand on his shoulder as she glances over the corpse for a moment. Yep, that's a dead human. It's too bad - but she's fresh from a war. Things like that happen.]

You've done everything you could. Even Rose couldn't bring folks back to life. [yeah so there's a lot of shit Bismuth doesn't know?] Why don't you go and sit down? Get some food or something, we're gonna have a long day ahead of us. I'll deal with this.

[holyspit]

I can't just- I need to do SOMETHING. I need to help him.

[Also, uh. Lots of blood, not great for the stomach, if he were to be completely mercenary for a second.]

And- you should have someone to help you. Someone who knows humans.

[That's a bit of a reach, he's got less than zero actually helpful training or knowledge here, despite the hours sunk into 'Under The Knife'.]

[nobodysbismuth]

...well, you got a point.

[Bismuth is okay enough with human blood and guts. It's unpleasant on several levels, but she doesn't have the same visceral reaction a lot of the other humans seem to. Doesn't vibrate wrong like seeing shards used to. In some ways that makes her an okay body toucher, but she's certainly never studied their anatomy either, so it's not ideal.

She can certainly believe Steven knows more than she does. What with his whole...whatever's going on with him.]

You sure you don't wanna go find someone else?

[holyspit]

[YES]

No. It- no one else should have to deal with this.

[what a perfectly healthy attitude]

[nobodysbismuth]

Alright.

[Well, uh...there's a bit of doubt here, but what is she gonna do, get in another argument with Steven?]

How 'bout I just look at this, and I'll let you know if I got any questions? We're gonna need to look around the room, too?

4

[reassuranceandrevolution]

Steven...

[Sigyn kneels down, placing a gentle hand on the young man's shoulder. She doesn't entirely understand what he's doing, but she's not going to question it now]

He's gone.

[holyspit]

I know, I KNOW! But- I can still help him, I've done it before!

[this is a normal and healthy reaction right]

[reassuranceandrevolution]

[Sigyn takes Steven's hand as they go down to the body again. Her grip is gentle, but firm]

Stop, he wouldn't want you to do this to yourself.