funvee: (Default)
Tony Stark ([personal profile] funvee) wrote in [community profile] bakerstreet2012-02-16 03:42 pm

The Circus arrives without warning...


The Night Circus



"The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Le Cirque des Rêves, and it is only open at night." - Erin Morgenstern

As you wander the grounds of Le Cirque des Rêves, black and white striped tents on all sides try to catch your attention. Which tent will you choose? Who will you meet in the tent? Or maybe you're a performer, ready to dazzle your audience as they walk in.

How does this meme work?
1 - Post a comment with your character's name and canon in subject.
2a - If you want to be a performer, add a tent number.
or
2b - If not, leave it blank.
3 - Tag others. Do NOT roll if they already have a number in their subject line. Roll (or choose) if they do not.

The Choices


1 - Isobel - The fortune teller. The tent is dark and silent. As you walk in, the noise and laughter of the rest of the circus falls away. As you feel blindly along the velvet tent walls, you encounter a beaded curtain. On the other side is either a fortune teller to tell you your future. Or maybe the fortune teller has left for a few moments, leaving behind nothing on the table but a set of black and white Tarot cards.

2 - Tsukiko - The contortionist. The contortionist does not have a tent. Round a corner, follow the path that circles the tents and you are likely to find the contortionist performing, feats of extraordinary dexterity and flexibility, slowly stuffing herself (or himself!) into a small glass box on the ground.

3 - Widget and Poppet - The animal trainers. The trainers perform outside of the tents, coaxing a multitude of black and white kittens to dance, to leap through hoops and run up and down curious and delighted audience members. Or maybe slip into the tent behind them, where two other animal trainers do similar tricks with leopards and panthers.

4 - The Illusionist - The illusionist performs in a small, black and white striped tent that holds no more than twenty. With theatrical gestures, the illusionist transforms a gentleman's scarf into a half-dozen white doves, produces flames that dance but do not burn, and even causes a tree to grow from an empty seat, pure white and silver blossoms blooming before the audience's eyes. Is it magic?

5 - Celia and Marco - The lovers. The fantastic circus and all its wonders are nothing but a backdrop for the forbidden love that has blossomed between the two of you. How will you keep your love a secret? Kisses stolen between striped tents? Bittersweet goodbyes as the sun rises and the wrought iron gates of the Night Circus closes for another day?

6 - Cloud Maze - This tent is one of the tallest in the circus, and once you slip between the black and white striped flaps, you see a tower of fluffy white mist. As you touch the mist, it is soft and warm against your hand. The more you explore, the more you see hanging platforms, ropes, and ribbons hidden among the white clouds. Through them you can climb to the top of the tower of white cloud. Do not be afraid of falling or jumping off the tower or the platforms, for the white misty clouds will support your weight, catch and envelop you in white.

7 - Bedtime Stories - This tent is small, almost hidden among the rest of the circus. Within is a room filled with shelves and tables, and bottles and jars litter every flat surface. Open a bottle, and a scent escapes. Breathe deep, and a story unfurls for you, so real that you can feel every touch. Will you share the stories with your companion? Or dare each other to try ever stranger experiences?

8 - The Wishing Tree - There is nothing in this tent except a sprawling tree that bears candles instead of leaves. Many of the candles are lit, their flames flickering in the slight breeze that permeates the tent. A card on the tree instructs you to take a candle from the tree and make a wish on it, lighting it with the flame from another wish. What will you wish for? It's said that wishes lit on the Wishing Tree come true...

9 - The Ice Garden - Everything inside this tent is white, and it takes only a moment to notice that the sprawling garden within the tent is created entirely of ice. Every posy petal, every delicate branch of a tree. The 'grass' beneath your feet is pure white snow, and brushing by a tree will send another sprinkle of white onto your head. How will you and your companion explore this place?

10 - The Labyrinth - This tent is just like any other from the outside, but as you walk in, it changes. Perhaps you'll find yourself in a library that smells of leather and is lit by flickering candles. Or a valley full of fine white sand flanked by rolling hills. Or maybe you find yourself in a giant silver birdcage. The possibilities within the Labyrinth are endless, but there are always two constants:
1 - the way into each new part of the labyrinth is not the way out.
2 - there is always a way out.

11 - Wild Card - There are more wonders at the Night Circus than the list above. Watching the acrobats or trapeze artists? Run through a Hall of Mirrors that shows uncannny insights? Eat delicious circus treats until dawn? All are possible!

How much of Le Cirque des Rêves can you explore before dawn?
fridgetothefire: (shadows limning me)

[personal profile] fridgetothefire 2012-02-17 01:39 am (UTC)(link)
I've know people I thought should have been dead.

[Which is very different from wanting to kill them. Her mother had been dead for years, Anya was sure, and only pathetic sentiment had kept her father from making it official. She wonders what happened to her mother after - after. Her son and husband killed, her daughters both vanished. But there is no answer to that question that Anya wants to hear, so she keeps it to herself as she follows the Sif's instructions.]
Edited 2012-02-17 01:44 (UTC)
brosif: (the goddess of war)

[personal profile] brosif 2012-02-17 02:08 am (UTC)(link)
Our thoughts in these matters make little difference. Our actions, however...

[She reaches for the tin cup, and holds it over the flame. With some visitors, she makes more of a show out of things. But here, her motions are almost surgical in their precision. She has done this before, she will again.

She pricks her own finger and lets it fall into the cup. Then she pours the water into a wooden basin.]


Rinse your hands in that and draw the first card. Do not worry about the water. It will leave the cardstock undamaged.
fridgetothefire: (ponder)

[personal profile] fridgetothefire 2012-02-17 03:14 am (UTC)(link)
[She washes her hands. She remembers reading Macbeth, in the long, terrible first year after she murdered her younger sister, wondering if other people actually felt that way, if there was something hideously wrong with her. Not for killing - which as far as Anya could tell was a fairly universal human and human-ish impulse - but for failing to fall apart afterward.]

Yes ma'am.

[She lets her hands drip, drawing a card and flipping it over.]
brosif: (Thor has great ideas)

[personal profile] brosif 2012-02-17 03:31 am (UTC)(link)
The Hierophant, reversed.

[The deck is old and the drawings look more like runes than illustrations. Still, there is a body upon a throne – such things are always understood. The card is upside down. In this deck, there is no crown.]

The spirit of a leader, in a precarious position. You have a vision, but you cannot accept responsibility for it.
fridgetothefire: (mysteries)

[personal profile] fridgetothefire 2012-02-17 06:01 am (UTC)(link)
[She shakes her head.]

That doesn't - make sense. I got out, my plans are over. Fait accompli.

And I'm not a leader.

[She's always been alone. She always will be. People are awful.]
brosif: (the goddess of war)

[personal profile] brosif 2012-02-17 06:29 am (UTC)(link)
You got out. Your plans are over. And yet you sit before me, and you must decide: are you a body or a person?