3. Breakfast Activities

Summary: Morning comes around, and some carnies just don't want to get up. Food helps, though-as well as some warnings from the Ringmaster...

Performers: Strongwoman Syrenne, Icebreather Lowell, Ticket Keeper Ariela, Tamer Zoran, Clown Zael, Ringmaster Asthar, Gamemaster Jirall

"Where is everybody?"

The Ticket Keeper let out a sigh as she pushed a few stray locks of her red hair back. "I don't know, Zoran." She responded as she poured some porridge into a few bowls. "Maybe they all decided to sleep in."

"Sleep in!?" The Tamer did not look pleased at this idea. In fact, he looked completely irritated. "I swear, if Pretty Boy and everyone else doesn't get here this minute, I'll have more than just one person to snap at for being late for breakfast! There's no way we could finish all this food ourselves, and it'll get cold!"

Zael didn't say a thing-the Clown merely observed the scene as he ate the porridge. He never really liked speaking much in the morning (he usually strained his voice when talking with the visitors, anyway), and he doubted that trying to tell Zoran to stop complaining about so many things wasn't going to help the situation.

"Well, then," The Icebreather's voice cooly replied as he rounded the corner of a tent and strode towards them, "At least you have Syrenne and I to help, hm?"

The Icebreather hadn't bothered to be completely clothed yet-he was still wearing no shirt, just like during practice. Despite being the one that controlled the ice, Lowell never seemed to mind the cold at all, unlike the Firebreather Yurick who absolutely hated the cold. Despite this, though, they were able to perform together at times-figure out new tricks for each other and wow the crowd in the process. It was almost like those two together were an endless experiment, with varying results that followed.

Syrenne, accompanying the Icebreather, did not look as pleased as him. In fact, she looked like she'd just dodged the devil. Her hair was disheveled, there were obvious dark circles around her eyes, and she was practically dragging herself towards them with both feet, shuffling slowly. "Need...meat..." She groaned quietly, letting herself sit on a nearby crate. "Need...booze..."

"You're getting the meat, but not the booze." Ariela told her firmly as she finished cooking some sausages. Zael grinned a bit at this, tempted to laugh, but decided against it-laughing at a hungover Syrenne was basically digging a grave for himself, after all.

"She said it." Zoran muttered as he handed a bowl of oatmeal to Syrenne. "Don't complain about it-you used up almost ALL of the booze we had in stock last night! Do you have any idea how long it'll take us to restock?!"

"Do we really need that filthy swill to drink?" A groan pierced the air, and everyone turned to see Gamemaster Jirall saunter over, arms crossed. "Really," He continued with a wave of his hand, "There has to be something better than the cheap stuff..."

"Shut up, Jirall-" Zoran started, crossing his arms, "At some of us are sensible with our money! We can't buy all the fancy stuff all the time-we aren't stupid enough to do that."

"Are you saying I'm that stupid, you mongrel!?" Jirall looked far from pleased at this remark, a snarl taking over his face. "How dare you insult me!" He took out a sword, pointing it at the Tamer as he continued speaking. "You're going to regret it..."

"Bring it on!" Zoran snapped, taking out a sword (he was glad he decided to carry it with him to breakfast this morning-just in case stupid people like Jirall decided to go and piss him off). "I'm not afraid of the likes of you!"

Before Ariela could yell at them to stop, or for Zael to leap in between the two and punch them both in the face, or for Lowell to freeze them both on the spot, or for Syrenne to go and pick them up by the shirt collars and give them her best glare, the Ringmaster intervened.

"Stay your blades."

Both Zoran and Jiral glared at each other, before putting away the swords and turning towards Ringmaster Asthar. As far as everyone knew, despite the jolly, optimistic man the Ringmaster could be-well, he had his scary, stern side also. Everyone knew very well not to go against his orders.

"As much as I understand at times that you both have your...disagreements," The Ringmaster continued, crossing his arms, "I do not want you trying to kill each other in front of the visitors to the carnival. That would not be a pretty sight, and it would be especially terrible for business. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Ringmaster." The other two muttered quietly, sitting down on some nearby crates. Ariela quickly passed them both some plates filled with fried eggs and sausages as the Ringmaster continued to speak.

"As for you, Strongwoman," He continued, glancing at Syrenne. "A night before the visitors come to the carnival is not a night for drinking the majority of the alcohol in stock for ourselves. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Ringmaster..." Syrenne uttered quietly, holding her head with both hands before Lowell passed a mug of coffee to her.

"Ringmaster Asthar, do you know why everyone else is late for breakfast?" Ariela asked as she handed the Ringmaster a cup of coffee. "It's taking them longer than usual to get here..."

The Ringmaster let out a sigh, shaking his head as he accepted the coffee. "Unfortunately, a vast majority of us were up a bit too late last night, especially Zesha, Zepha, Mirania, Dagran, Callista, and even Therius and Yurick, whose tent caught on fire as well, apparently. Therius and Yurick are patching up Yurick's tent, and I sent everyone else back to sleep. I do not want anyone looking sleep-deprived when the visitors arrive at noon-it won't look good for any of us, either."

Everyone else exchanged glances. If everyone else was asleep, that meant two things. One, they had to finish all of this breakfast or let it get cold for the others to eat, because they were way too lazy to try to reheat it.

The other thing was that it was definitely going to take longer than usual to set up for the carnival. That was not good...

Author note: Now, for more carnie profile things! (More detailed carnie profiles will be put up in a later chapter.)

Zael-Clown-I had to do it. Absolutely had to, with the fact that he could use prank bananas with that crossbow of his and that he always tried to help out others. He was one of the more optimistic out of the mercenaries in the game, in my opinion, so I thought he would want to make people smile.

Ariela-Ticket Keeper-Well, she seemed to be the type to be welcoming to all (I mean, she practically runs the entire tavern-okay, her dad Kentis owns it, but still-), so I thought

Zoran-Tamer-Well, he must be good with animals-how else would he have gotten all those Reptids locked up and ready to release into Lazulis City?

Jirall-Gamemaster-Well, someone has to be in charge of those game booths. And someone has to be tricky and elusive enough to act charming enough so that people will WANT to play at those expensive game booths...right?

Syrenne-Strongwoman-Well...yeah. Strongwoman-Syrenne is a very strong woman, as we all know-and surely more terrifying when drunk. I felt like something of strength would work with her, hence the position of Strongwoman.

Lowell-Icebreather-basically, an Icebreather is like a Firebreather, except they do it with ice. And Lowell can control ice powers, so...

General Asthar-Ringmaster-He was the amazing father figure in the Last Story-and a good boss, too. Because of this, I knew he'd make the perfect Ringmaster. XD Yay, Asthar!

So, that's basically all of the reasons why I had so-and-so as a certain carnie. Next chapter, the visitors enter the carnival! What shall they encounter? We'll see a few charming acts-from the views of Catoleya, Braso and Leolio! Thanks for reading-I hope you enjoyed this chapter!