Forums » General Roleplay » Trick-or-Treat: Don't be SHAI (closed)

((sorry, I couldn't think of a very good title so I just fell back on my pun-making.. uh.. skills?))

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Shai was never really one to stay in one place for an extended period of time. But then they had learned about the tradition of Halloween (which went by many different names and methods of celebration throughout the universe) and, well, it sounded fun. The chance to interact with new people and give out both treats AND tricks... and they could even do it in costume!
Shai had decided to stop by Earth to celebrate this holiday. It certainly wasn't their favourite planet, but it did seem to be a place where Halloween was very popular. And besides, it seemed to be a hub for certain travelers, both intergalactic and interdimensional (and inter-everything else, actually) so it seemed reasonably likely that even non-human beings might visit them too.
Of course, Shai didn't have a house on Earth (or anywhere, for that matter), so instead they had just parked their spaceship in a big open field. Would the Earth-dwellers notice that it was real and not just an elaborate replica? Shai wasn't sure, and didn't care either way. They were just excited to see what would happen.
The exterior of the ship was hung with orange lights and paper cutouts of jack-o-lanterns, skulls, and ghosts all in a rainbow of colours. A sign hung on the entry hatch, a sheet of cardboard with the words "Trick-or-Treat!!" written in pencil. Shai sat inside with a big bowl of treats, and they sipped on a cup of apple cider (the non-alcoholic kind) as they awaited visitors. Their costume included a hooded black robe and a very real-looking scythe; apparently Shai was dressed as the Grim Reaper.

The massive mechanical hulk came thundering out of the forest nearby, a large shipping container slung under one of his guns. The doors were somewhat closed, but the crate showed whole buckets of candy, and even other things. Crudely spraypainted on the said was, "I'll take anything you give me, and take whatever you want from here. I can't have it myself, may as well put it to good use." The multiple eyes adorning his face pulsed slowly, his torso rotation at a similarly sluggish pace. Eventually, it ended up facing the large ship in the field, and the hulking mech started walking towards it. It was slightly awkward; he couldn't move much faster than a loping jog, and even then he could still be outrun by anyone with any kind of track-and-field training. He eventually made it to the ship, and the large guns on his side tilted upward, the massive bolts sliding back as they disarmed themselves, and Valentine said, "Trick or treat!" In a happy, flanged tone.

Shai set down their cider and opened the ship's hatch. Of all the possible visitors they might get, they certainly weren't expecting the first one to be a giant mech. Not that they minded, of course - Shai was happy to give out treats to anyone.
"Hey there!" They greeted, giving their guest a big smile. They read the lettering spray-painted onto the container, and rummaged around in their bowl of treats. They pulled out a pair of cookies wrapped in plastic, and stepped over to put them into the container.
"How's your Halloween going so far?" Shai asked cheerfully.

His waist coupling shifted as his torso tilted to look at Shai. "It has been going quite well. I thought that Halloween was the most fun holiday that I could participate in, so I'm amassing this crate of goods to give out to people who may be a bit too far out of the city to trick-or-treat here. Needless to say, I haven't met any resistance. Even the police dissipated their barricade to let me through to here. No clue why." He added the last part rather sarcastically. "How has yours been?"

Shai laughed a little at the sarcastic comment. "Well, it seems like a really cool thing you're doing here!" They said, flashing a quick grin. "As for me... Well, you're the first one to visit today, so I don't have much to report that you don't already know. Still, I'd consider this to be a good start!"

He nodded. "That's good to hear. By the way, My name is Leroy Valentine, you can call me Valentine. May I ask yours?" He said kindly. He shifted his footing some and slid the crate off his gun and nudged open the doors. "Feel free to take whatever you want for being so kind to me."

"Oh! My name's Shai!" They replied. "It's nice to meet ya!" They looked into the container, curious to see if there was any juice or other drinks in there, since they couldn't eat. If not, they would gladly take a few treats to give to future visitors instead.

A large set of coolers sat just behind the front, containing anything from cases of soda to bottles of cider, both alcoholic and not.

Shai selected a few drinks, not wanting to take too much but also quite eager to try a few new things. They didn't take anything alcoholic, since they had no idea how it might affect them (and anyway, they had seen alcohol before and it always smelled so awful and made people do weird things.)
Carefully setting the drinks inside the ship, Shai gave Valentine another grin. "Thanks so much!" They said.

He nodded, lifting the crate back onto his carbine, and said, "You are very welcome." And began to walk off. "Oh, and by the way..." His center eye slid open and a coin spun out, landing at her feet. It has a stylized A on it, and on the flip side, she would see a minimalist depiction of Leroy. "Come see me fight sometime; You'll enjoy it." And with that, the titan lumbered off, happy to have made an acquaintance with a new friendly soul.

Shai bent down to pick up the coin. They slipped it into their pocket, then went back into their ship to await more visitors.

Eliane peered curiously up at the spaceship, eyes wide in awe. Out of all the places she has visited thus far, this one was the most unique in that it didn't look like anything on this world. She honestly had stumbled upon it through sheer luck after she had seen a large mech heading away from this area and she had been curious to find out what was out here. Halloween was still a relatively new concept to her, but she had seen how fun it had looked and she wanted to try it out. A pair of black cat ears sat perched on top of her head and she had pinned a cats tail to the back of her shorts. It had taken her a few tries but she eventually managed to paint whiskers on her face that didn't look crooked. All in all, it was a very basic costume, but she thought she had done well for her very first time dressing up. She stepped up to the opening and gave a bright smile. "Trick or treat!" she called out, plastic pumpkin extended.

Upon hearing the girl call out, Shai stood up excitedly from their seat. Another visitor!
They opened the hatch and looked Eliane up and down for a moment.
"Hiya!" They said, giving her a bright smile. "You're a kitty, huh? That's adorable! Alright, any particular kind of treat you want? I've got lots of different things here."

She tapped her chin in thought as she deliberated, pumpkin swinging gently by her side as she thought. "Do you have fruit or cookies?" She asked curiously, head tilting to the side. She had certainly accumulated quite a bit of candy at this point and she thought it couldn't hurt to try and find new things to try instead of just chocolate.

"Hm..." Shai hummed in consideration as they looked through the treats set out around them. "No fruit... but I've got these pumpkin-spice cookies with little smiley faces made of frosting!" They held two of these cookies out, each one wrapped in plastic, for Eliane to see. "What do you think? Wanna try 'em?"

Halloween was... a bit of a strange concept for Flux. The humans seemed to enjoy dressing up in funny clothes and going to their big nests of wood and concrete, just to give each other pieces of food that they couldn't get enough of. But Flux was not complaining. If it made the humans happy, then Flux was going to enjoy it, too. Clearly, whatever this event was, it was something to keep around once Flux ruled over the planet as their new god...

Flux shuffled to what appeared to be a large metal craft. Flux has seen these things before when it was lost in the depths of space, before it came to earth. Creatures loved to fly in these things, from what it saw. Maybe there was someone inside?

Flux approached the hatch of the ship, holding an empty garbage bag. Humans were carrying around bags and buckets, and Flux saw a human pull this big black bag out of a small box... These were the right kind of bags, right?
Flux wasn't dressed up, but that was okay; who needs a costume when you already weren't that human, anyway?

Flux had heard the human offspring shout a strange phrase whenever they were at the entrance of a human nest.... Flux decided to try it out, even if its verbal communication was lacking. "Triiiick.... Rrrrrr.... Trrrreat!"

Shai looked over at the new arrival and waved. Something about this creature unnerved them, although they weren't sure why. Well, it didn't matter. Unnerving or not, all guests deserved treats. This was certainly more interesting than just being visited by a pile of humans, anyway.
"Yo," Shai said in greeting. "Congrats on being the third visitor... What kind of treats do you like?"

Flux understood what Shai was asking, but it had trouble telling them what it wanted. After both trying and failing to tell Shai what it was after, it got frustrated and resorted to charades.

Flux held its "hands" up near its face, pretending it was gnawing at food. It was making noise that, while garbled, sounded like crunching. Maybe it wanted something crunchy?

Shai was a bit unclear on what Flux was trying to communicate, even with the charades. "Sorry, um, I'm not sure—" They turned away, rummaging around in their collection of treats for a moment. Turning back to Flux with a few items in their hands, they said, "Why don't you just pick what you like out of this stuff? Take as much or as little as you want." They held out a plain milk chocolate bar, a lollipop, and a few mini bags of chips in a variety of flavours.

Flux looked mildly unimpressed, but no matter.

It brought its attention to the pillowy plastic things- the bag of chips- and took one out. It wasn't sure how this was supposed to be edible, but upon shaking the bag it heard something inside. It bit into the bag, puncturing it with its teeth, making it jump out of shock. It pried one of the holes open and removed a single chip. It looked thin and hard, and after popping the chip into its mouth, it discovered that the chips were exactly what it was looking for. Flux could barely taste anything, because of how poorly its taste buds worked, so it primarily goes off of texture. And it loved crunchy things. These chips were wonderful!

Flux quickly scarfed down what was in the bag of chips, and then took a second bag from Shai and popped it into its garbage bag, which it could eat later. It looked up at Shai, and let out a distorted "thank you" before it turned around to leave. Flux looked very content!