It's All Fun And Games

[March]

It's evening and the sun has begun to set, the Fair in turn lighting up with colorful bulbs, rides swirling them into lines, patterns blinking and circling. Suddenly a loud blast cuts through the music and shouts turn from excitement to surprise. A section near the Living Wagons has gone dark, lights having gone out with a small explosion and a moment later a figure leaps up onto one of the wagons, silhouetted against the setting sun, holding a long, narrow sword in one hand and a small sports-bag in the other. Sheathing the blade the figure breaks into a run, jumping from wagon to wagon and towards the swinging boat ride.

Leaping towards the oncoming boat the figure lands on the bow of the ship and lets it carry them higher. Illuminated by the rides lights is a woman wearing a red and gold marching band or bellhop uniform with golden epaulets and a matching hat. Covering the top half of her face is a white rabbit mask, ears standing straight up and poking through holes in the hat's brim. Trailing from the bag she's holding are colorful pound notes.


((open))

[Will Stanton]

Will, who had taken some time out of her day to explore the carnival, raised an eyebrow at the bouncing rabbit lady.

She reached up to grab one of the "pound notes", to check it out. She'd been money, after all, so she knew a thing or two about pound notes.

[March]

Grabbing one of the notes out of the air is simple enough. It's a valid pound note alright. Watermark and everything, a little bit crumpled and folded from having passed through numerous hands. Somewhere in the distant distressed shouts are calling out now, shouting something about a thief and the day's earnings.

Above Will the woman runs along on the back of the rows of seats, narrowly avoiding peoples' heads with an unnatural precision. She almost seems to be running in place as the ship swings past underneath her until she gets to the other end of it, reaching it just as the ship reaches the apex of it's swing. Crouching on the end of the boat, both feet planted on the rim and steadying herself with her one free hand she swings up and away as the boat moves back the other way amidst the screams of the people on board.

Around Will people have stopped and are pointing, muttering.

[Will Stanton]

"Woah! Rabbit lady! Be careful up there; it's not safe!" Will called out.

[March]

The woman turns her head as the ship raises her up and takes a moment to find Will in the crowd. Her upper body shakes a little as she seems to chuckle, too quiet to hear over the general commotion of the fair and the crowd. Taking her hand off of the rim she draws the rapier hanging at her side in the same movement and swishes it through the air in a flourish that ends with her arm in front of her mid-section as she takes a bow.

"Why thanks but I wouldn't have it any other way!" she calls out. "And the name's March!" she adds just as the ship reaches the extent of it's swing and she hangs weightlessly in the air for a moment before she jumps for the roof of the neighboring bumper cars ride.

[Will Stanton]

"Woah, that sword's gonna hurt someone," Will said, bounding up after March. "Stop stop stop!"

[Janice Gilbertson]

A somewhat agitated blonde girl is making her way through the crowd. She's had to change directions a few times, as the lady in the mask leaps to new locations. In her wake, people are having awful luck at the carnival games.

[March]

"That's rather observant of you. Isn't that the point of swords?" she asks as she running, thrusting the rapier in Will's general direction before bringing it back to her side in a flourish. And in the movement it cuts through part of a ply-board bumper-car decoration sticking up above the rim of the roof. A thin glowing line appears where she struck it mid-stride, moving past it without breaking the rhythm of her running. And after a heartbeat or two the glowing line explodes with concussive force, sending a chunk of the decoration flying into Will's path.

[Will Stanton]

Will bent backwards, awkwardly, limboing unnaturally under the plywood shards.

"Woah! THAT'S not good. Stopstopstopstopstop," she said, continuing the chase, now bounding a little faster from cart to cart as she tried to close the distance.

[Janice Gilbertson]

"Dammit, dammit, stop just... stop," the girl on the sidelines pleads.

And that's about when half the bumper cars take a sudden swerve towards the center of the arena.

[March]

March keeps running along on the roof, although Will can see from below that it's mainly just some wood panels laid across a framework of metal pipes slotted into each other. As Will lands on one of the cars, startling the crap out of the driver, making the car swerve into the path of others, who in turn all ram into each other head-on. That's what they're made for, obviously, but this many bumping into each other shake the whole arena. Enough that up above a single fitting that hasn't been tightened perfectly is shaken loose, a single metal piece swinging free just as March's foot lands on the roof tile balanced on it, tile slipping as March's foot slips through the resulting hole and the rabbit-lady goes tumbling through.

She somehow manages to turn her fall into a roll in the middle of the bumper cars, hopping to her feet and reaching for the tall connector antenna on the bumper car Will is on, bending it back and holding it long enough to smirk at him, eyes sparkling through the eye-holes in her mask before letting go, smacking Will right in the face with the antenna.

[Will Stanton]

With a solid *thwock*, the antenna slammed into Will's face, digging a gauge down the center of her nose, and causing her to fly backwards onto the floor of the bumper car arena.

[March]

"You tripped me up." March notes, stepping across the cart Will had been on and pointing her rapier at the green-haired girl. "How'd you do that." she demands curiously.

[Will Stanton]

"I dunno what you're talking about," Will whined, rubbing her face. "But you're going to hurt someone if you keep that up!"

[March]

"Not you then. Somebody else." she decides, head turning to scan the crowd.

[Janice Gilbertson]

The girl at the edge of the arena bites her lower lip, then ducks over to a nearby booth. After a tense discussion with a carnie she forks over a five-quid note and starts winding back to the arena with something in her hands.

[March]

"You! The blonde girl!" she calls out Janice who seems to be the only one who isn't just watching the scene or backing away from it at this point.

[Janice Gilbertson]

"...bloody hell," she mutters and digs her teeth into the object she has in her hands.

And that's when a couple dozen small, cheap rubber balls are unleashed into the bumper car arena in a pattern that would give most mathematicians and physicists pause.

[March]

March stops from advancing on Will and looks at the rubber balls for a couple beats.

"Quite riveting." she says and then breaks into a sprint towards Janice. Her eyes are darting around the floor and her footsteps somehow manage to miss the balls, sometimes by next to nothing as she advances with an eerily steady pace. That is until one of the balls hits an unpopped kernel of popcorn someone must have dropped and it goes bouncing at a weird angle and March's foot comes down on it in the exact second it crosses her path. "How--!?" She goes flying and with one hand holding the sword she's forced to let go of the bag full of money to catch herself while her ill-gotten gains slide across the floor.

[Will Stanton]

And that's when Will leaped at her, coming down and increasing her mass to pin the rabbit thing to the floor.

[March]

March rolls to the side, avoiding most of the bulk coming down on top of her, although Will still pins one of her legs to the ground as she's lieing on her back.

"I don't have time for this!" she says, annoyed that she got caught off-guard. She flicks her rapier at Will, tip glowing and leaving a similarly shimmering cut on Will. She twists herself until she has one foot under her and then pushes herself away the exact moment the shimmering cut explodes and frees her foot from the Will-goop.

[Will Stanton]

Will cried out as her leg exploded, sending some grey goop onto the bumper cars.

"Gosh darn it!" she cried out, stretching out a shaky arm, but just missing March as she dashed away.

[Janice Gilbertson]

Just as the masked woman manages to right herself, she spies the blonde girl scrambling back over the turnbuckle of the bumper car arena and into the crowd.

Notably, the bag of money is no longer on the floor of the arena.

[March]

"Most unfortunate! Blast it!" March curses and dashes after Janice. Hopping over the railing she runs across the 'street', dodging and weaving through the crowd, avoiding people with pin-point accuracy and almost zig and zagging back and forth like a metronome. Reaching the other side she runs straight at the side of a booth selling food, foot against the wall giving her enough lift to plant the other on a small outcropping and from there to the roof. Two more steps to the edge, leaping with outstretched hand, grabbing hold of one of the seat of the whizzing Chair-O-Plane and she's whisked into the air. And a heart-beat later she seems to lose her grip, going flying away from the spinning attraction. But instead of crashing down hard she's flung right into a game-booth and into a pile of cheap stuffed animals a good ten paces or so in front of Janice.

"I believe you have something that belongs to me!" she informs her dramatically as she hops out of the booth with one hand planted on the counter. The other hand is brandishing her rapier at Janice.

[Janice Gilbertson]

"Didn't see your name on it," she hedges, circling slowly around as her eyes dart about the surroundings.

"You know, if I were you I would've just run," she bluffs.

[March]

"I was on my way when you intervened. That was you, was it not?" she demands, taking a small step forward but keeping some distance from Janice.

[Janice Gilbertson]

"I more mean that if you stick around, things are going to get worse for you, right up to the police arriving."

[March]

"As much as that would make for a magnificent chase, I'd rather not. Now if you would hand over my bag..." she says, taking another step and brandishing her rapier.

[Will Stanton]

From behind, Janice could catch Will crawling towards Match -- the conversation had been going on long enough that she had recovered somewhat.

[Janice Gilbertson]

"Well, when you ask that way..."

She tosses the bag at March, the spin as it tumbles is the sort that makes your head hurt if you think about it too much.

"Catch!"

[March]

March shifts her stance in small jolts, adjusting bit by bit like she's moving to a steady rhythm before suddenly bursting forward and grabbing the erratic bag by the flapping handles with perfect timing. The momentum and angle of it force her into bit of a spin however before she stops in a wide stance, low to the ground.

"Good. You've seen reason." she informs Janice dramatically.

[Will Stanton]

"Sorry, not reason. We're all mad here," Will said from behind her, lashing out with a punch.

[March]

March spins around just in time to get punched in the face, stumbling backwards and swinging the bag full of money into him and knocking him to the side, right into the path of the rapier thrusting up and into his shoulder.

"Too bad, I'd thought I'd made my point quite clear." she says with a hint of amusement in her voice.

[Will Stanton]

March now had one (1) skewered Will on a stick; perfect carnival food.

She grimaced, and tried to slide her way off the sword, letting it cut through whatever clay was necessary to free herself.

[March]

"You make a fine pin-cushion." she laughs and flicks the rapier upwards and out of Will's shoulder, leaving behind a big gouge in the clay.

"But I'm afraid I have no time for games; I must be off."

[Janice Gilbertson]

Janice is backing away as Will engages.

But for the first time that March can probably remember, her grip on the rapier slips as she flicks it upwards, sending it tumbling end over end in the air.

[March]

March's weapon twirls in the air and finally lands, blade spiked into the ground almost perfectly straight, wobbling a little from the weight of the hilt, a rabbit with ears swept back to form the hand-guard. March immediately leaps for it, turning her back on Will to pull her rapier from the ground as she runs past it, making a break for it.

[Will Stanton]

Will shot out each arm, grabbing March's arms.

Then she shot out each LEG, wrapping around each of March's legs.

"The thing is, I do make a good pincushion." she said, trying to reel the rabbit back in.

[March]

"Very well then!" March exclaims when she suddenly finds herself held in place, moving her arms to test how much give Will's arms have. She closes her eyes and exhales with a huff.

A second passes.

Flexing her wrist back and forth she swings the bag up in front of her, along the tip of her weapon, before letting it go. The bag flies a couple feet into the air, a jagged glowing line on it's side as it hangs in the apex of the throw. Then it explodes, sending wads and loose notes of cash flying in the same moment March hops backwards, closer towards Will, creating enough slack in the outstretched limbs to spin around. Amidst the shower of money her weapon flashes one, two, three, four times in rapid succession and Will's limbs noodle to the floor, severed from the parts that wrapped around March.

[Will Stanton]

Call Will stumpy, then, because she fell to the floor with her limbs severed, flailing around uselessly.