estoria | [ open ] 'cause baby you're a firework

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[ open ] 'cause baby you're a firework

Who: Open mingle for any interested Cerealians! Or those who come by the park coincidentally.
When: ICly whatever Friday is happening during Event 33.
Where: The Park in the Residential District.
What: In an effort led by a ten year old and a sword that is not ten years old, Post-Robocolypse Cerealia gets a fireworks, watermelon, bottled water, and BYOB (bring your own blanket/beer/barbecue) late-summer early-fall afternoon celebration. That ends with the fireworks. Nothing can go wrong! (Anything you so desire can go wrong.)
Rating/Warning: There's watermelon to be cut and fireworks to be set off, so potential injury and fire involved.

There's very little formality to the whole of the affair. Anyone who wants can wander into the park, a few tables set up to hold water bottles, the area clear of debris and former robotic gardeners. Any dangerous areas of vegetation have been carefully marked with CAUTION — POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS tape. There are several watermelons carefully corralled together on the ground, paper plates, and a bag for trash tied to one of the tables.

Nearby, there's also a whole table of fireworks, from the handheld to the relatively safe to set off to the this probably should only be handled by a professional, but no lighters; all of those are kept over with the water bottles. Safety First!

The later afternoon is for slicing and serving watermelon and water (or any of the foods that people may choose to bring), with Chihiro at least fully encouraging people to use weapons to cut the watermelon (...) and turn it into a kind of impromptu show. Once the skies are dark enough, the fireworks will begin. Anyone willing to help out will be generally welcome, and sparklers and the smallest fireworks are around for anyone to grab hold of and have fun. The truly big fireworks are going to be set off at the far end of the park by a few brave, intrepid souls. (Unless someone keeps Chihiro away, that includes one ten year old.)

Pray they don't like themselves on fire or explode themselves, especially as almost every person at the party is probably guaranteed to not be fully functional. What can go wrong? Let's have a watermelon and fireworks show!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

watermelon daze

[ ( i ) To anyone who has shown up with a weapon in tow, there's a good chance Chihiro will carefully weigh her options before eventually extending them an invitation: ]

Do you want to cut one of the watermelons?

[ ( ii ) To those who've shown up who do not have any visible weaponry, or anything that doesn't look like it's useful for cutting or smashing watermelons (she has standards for her entertainments), Chihiro is holding up a plate of cut slices of watermelon as an offering. ]

Would you like some?

sparkler wars

[ ( a ) If you're roughly around her age, or anyone Chihiro feels more relaxed with (does she know you, has she smiled for you, then you may count), there's a decent chance that once the sparklers come out and she sees you with one? She'll stamp a foot and dramatically point her own sparkler at you with an exclaimed: ]

Ha!

[ Not that she's actually dueling or even getting close enough for sparks to generally fly at anyone else (it's rude enough to be pointing). Almost immediately after, she'll grin and break into laughter before running away, sparkler held out to her side. ]

Betcha can't catch me!

[ There is literally no one she knows in Cerealia who cannot, actually, catch her. Probably. Unless they're presently blind, deaf, or, well, unable to have full use of their body.

( b ) The clearly incapacitated and strangers aren't greeted with any dares to catch her. Instead, she smiles and trots closer, carefully holding her sparkler out to the side and further away from them. ]

Did you want one of the sparklers too?

the big ones

[ Small children and large fireworks should probably not cross over, let alone when said children have had difficulty with vision loss off and on the last few days. None of her blind spells have lasted for more than an hour, which she's thankful for. It'd really suck to miss the whole firework show, though the whine as they're set off is kind of ear rending.

She's rolling out a fuse so that it can be lit from a good four meters away, joining the array of other such fuses as if she has any idea what she's doing. (She doesn't.) ]

Think this is far enough?

[ And, with another pause, expression serious for the time being: ]

Will we see them really good from over here?

[ Everything will be entirely fine. ]

during the fireworks show

[ Disaster or not, at least some of the fireworks go As Planned. Chihiro's even watching them with wide eyes and a small, happy smile on her face, hands held up to her chest. It's a small, happy moment, after a whole lot of unhappy ones.

She's in a good enough mood that when her vision cuts out again, she just makes a muted noise of frustration... and keeps on staring skyward. ]

At least I got to see some of them.

[ It's not a total victory... but heck if it isn't a meaningful one in and of itself. Though forgive her if she ends up flopping down on the ground and lying on her back. She can at least concentrate on hearing the fireworks even if she can't see them.

... Which might be problematic if she's still near where they're being set off. Sparks, sparks, stay away, come again never??? ]

This is generally a bad idea. Eiji doesn't like explosions enough when he's fighting, but in normal human form, the sound and shockwaves are bad enough he's shaking.

He's ready to go home when he sees Chihiro lying way too close to the fireworks.

"Chihiro, move!"

It should be enough just to warn her it's not safe there, maybe go over to help, but he's not thinking that clearly. Thus, screaming and running over at full speed.

Sorry about making you panic too now.

Chihiro jolts up, hearing Eiji call out and not hearing or feeling anything immediately off. Then again, she hears the whine and screech of fireworks heading skyward, the boom that echoes back down once they explode, and it doesn't sound threatening so much as happening.

Yet she can't see, and so she rolls over and pushes up to her feet, arms out at her sides for balance as she whips her head this way, then the other way, trying to hear what Eiji has seen. Darting around without knowing where is liable to get her into trouble all on its own.

"Which way?!"

She calls back in turn, heart beating frantically against the confines of her chest.

That's no good--she's going even closer now.

"No, not that way!"

He closes the distance, determined not to let her get too far away--he absolutely can't let himself fail another little girl. He can feel ash falling down on him, but the blast pressure from the close explosions is what worries him--they're too close, and she's going to get hurt.

"Over here, follow my voice!"

She hesitates, lurching backward and stumbling. She doesn't run, because a blind run when she doesn't remember what her surroundings look like feels like a bad idea. Which is how Eiji now has Chihiro trying to keep very calm and walking with big lifts of her feet toward where she thinks he's calling out from. Her arms are held out to her sides so she can keep her balance, brow furrowed as she concentrates on the way her feet feel as they touch ground and she hopes there's nothing planted right in her way.

Honestly, with all the smells and sounds, she can't tell if something really is burning too close to her, or if this might be part of what Eiji had mentioned before about not being okay with fireworks. She's also not trying to figure that out yet, instead steadily trudging forward.

It is, admittedly, mostly him not being okay with fireworks. And he'll admit it when he finally gets out of panic mode. But he's not even close to that until she's close enough that he can try to take her hand.

"I'm going to try to lead you farther away. Where it's safer."

She tenses and jumps when he takes her hand, because without visual aids, it's a surprise (albeit a warm one). She relaxes as he's speaking, changing her gait so that she's keeping her feet low and skimming over the ground to bump into any obstacles or inform herself on changes in the ground before she steps down hard and injures herself.

"Are you okay, Eiji-san?" Either way, she nods, allowing him to lead her where he will.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

His voice says he's anything but, and Chihiro might notice his hand is trembling.

"It's another step up here. Better view, but not as close."

Wordlessly, she gives his hand a squeeze. He'd said before he didn't handle fireworks well. It looks like that much was definitely holding true.

"Mm, okay." The view is irrelevant to her at the moment, but it matters to him, she guesses, and so she goes along. Getting away from the fireworks doesn't hurt her. It definitely seems to be helping him. "Let me know when we're there."

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Fireworks

what a lovely evening in the park tbh

Re: what a lovely evening in the park tbh

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Sparkler Wars.

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sparklers

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