CHAPTER FINALE ♔ cause it's always raining in my head

[narcosynthesis]

♬ oceano - josh groban

WHO || Keijen Blade, Nadia Reichenov, Rafael Giovanni, Buffy Summers, Alainn O'Rourke, Myrilandel Odair, Finnick Odair, Desmond Descant, Elena Gilbert, Rose Hathaway, Fredrick Jr., Jack Chessing, Kat Samcelot, Jeanne Gar, Spike, Sterling Archer, Violet Reedhym, Burt Becksworth, Isabella Alessandro
WHAT || Failboat does the Grammy's, tries to stop Keijen Blade's performance from reaching the masses, and aspires to save Nadia
WHERE || Staples Center, Los Angeles
WHEN || Feb 8th, 2015
HOW || Actionspam. Single thread.

The day has finally arrived: the 2015 Grammy's gather together musical talent at the top of the food chain, which means that NOVA Records will be well represented at this year's ceremony. Unfortunately, this includes performances from Keijen Blade's band, Heatless Passion, and Nadia Reichenov's, Derere, both of whom are working for "Chad Becksworth", aka Draken Crombe, head of the Shadowkind-hating cult, the Church of the Lord's Humanity.  Equipped with some sort of ability to hypnotize large crowds with subliminal messages, Wynn fears what lies beneath Keijen's intended performance, and is sending his Knights to shut down the broadcast, to prevent that message from being spread to millions of viewers worldwide.

Meanwhile, the gang finally has a chance to see Rafael Giovanni again - but what he's been up to in the months since they last saw him, and how his reunion with Buffy will go, remains to be seen.

Several of the Knights have decided that this is their last chance as well to try and break Nadia free from Keijen's influence, now that they've learned the truth about him - that Keijen is in fact Kel'in'hrae, sadistic son of the Nightmare God Malaak'a, likely working to free his father from the prison Sehanine had created for him.  The prison sealed by the relic that the team has been chasing for years, believing it to be an immortality-granting talisman of great power.

The truth, it seems, was worse than they could have imagined.  

One step at a time, however, and stopping the signal is first priority on Failboat's to do list for now.  With an actual plan under their belts this time, maybe this is the turning point they've been waiting for...    

Comments

[slay]

[ what the fuck is even happening tho. like. what. just. buffy looks around like is anyone else watching this?? ? why is this happening ?? is she already controlled by keijen? ?? is azrael in the house ?? ? ]

[littledhampir]

[And the more hell references that appear, the more Rose is wondering if maybe this event was sponsored by one of the Nine, shifting uncomfortably as Madonna takes the stage.

Though that could be more to do with Madonna than the demon blood rite.]

[doubletake]

[This is an improvement, and she taps her foot to the song as she watches, amused by the show. Weird theme going on tonight tho.]

[nepotism]

[ the performance is followed up by the best rock album award. nominees are:

the black keys
derere
tom petty and the heartbreakers
heatless passion
and u2 ]

Bono's got this one in the bag, right?

[nothingsodivine]

[the black keys provide a chunk of des's playlist so secretly he's hoping for them i guess and doesn't know why.

Still. he's wary now.]

Brace yourselves.

[because ... it's probably gonna be blade or nadia lbr.]

[littledhampir]

Yeah, I hope Nadia beats him. [Him being Keijen. Rose is Team Bono.

Well okay her mun is.]

[doubletake]

[Elena tilts her head in Fred's direction.]

One would hope...

[narcosynthesis]

[ "And the winner is... Heatless Passion - "The Heat of the Moment!" wild applause breaks out as the screen shows blade rising from his seat. his expression is nothing but smugly victorious - there's not a hint of surprise there.

♬ everything i've known - korn

a snippet of one of the band's songs floods the room as he makes his way to the stage, but there's no indication that it's having the sort of effect his performance in new york had exerted on the audience. ]

[littledhampir]

[Not even going to applaud for the sake of blending, Rose is just going to sit there and embrace resting bitch-face.]

[bigbad]

[Damn, Spike could use Nadia winning something to help with his urge to punch everything in sight. Instead he just sulks back into his seat and glowers at the stage.]

[nothingsodivine]

[the mere sight of blade's smug face on stage makes des's expression twist into a quiet snarl of fury.

hiss hiss blade hiss.]

[doubletake]

[Kill it with fire, basically.]

[narcosynthesis]

[ ♬ getting away with murder - papa roach

keijen ascends to the stage, letting one of his bandmates yank the award from the presenter's hand as blade ignores it entirely, turning to the mic instead. he looks out across the audience with clear disdain riding in the curve of his lip, and then leans forward to deliver his speech. ]

Look at you. All of you. Living amongst you all is a cancer. A social disease: an acceptance of something so insidious that our blindness to it is creating a world full of idiotically complacent fools. Panderers, imbeciles, victims all, and perfectly blissful in their ignorance.

We must not settle for this malignancy. We must fight it. I come before you to lead a revolution - to teach you all to listen and to see that which has been here all along for what it really is.

[ the screens above panning audience shots catch "chad becksworth" in the audience, next to the mind master, with a little smirk curving up his cheek. ]

This award shows that you recognize the power of this message, whether consciously or not. There is no stopping what has begun.

A change is coming, and we are the heralds of it.

[nothingsodivine]

[motherfucker.

des's grimace of distaste only gets worse as blade continues to speak, the truth of everything rolling about in his head like angry waves, putting his words into sharp perspective.

his knuckles go white as he digs them into the armrest.]

[littledhampir]

[Maybe if she just sits here and imagines the look on Keijen's face when he gets taken down by Archer or something equally amusing she'll be able to keep the scowl off her features.

Nope. But that image is still keeping her from spewing out a line of muttered insults.]

[slay]

[ Meanwhile, Buffy is looking around like IS ANYONE DRINKING THIS PSYCHOPATH'S KOOLAID? SERIOUSLY? He just called the entire human race cancer ?? ? ]

[shootfirst]

[ everyone is actually wildly applauding, and as keijen and co leave the stage, ll cool j comes back on the screen to follow it up. "Well, alright, that was Keijen Blade of Heatless Passion, delivering a stirring call to social action." ]

Oh come on.

[doubletake]

Stirring my ass. He sounds like he's taking crazy pills.

[Like, seriously, who would clap for that? He talks like he belongs on a tabloid being accused of abusing every drug under the sun.

If only it were that instead of the truth.]

[nothingsodivine]

It's a social justice thing. I bet you anything a bunch of aggrieved bloggers just took that entirely out of context. God, I hate the internet.

[sigh.]

[65]

[finnick feels like he's living some hunger games realness rn. like when johanna or katniss would lash out and shriek on national television and the capitol people were like lol how quaint and entertaining!!!1 except the entire world is the capitol now and keijen is like five million shades worse than his sociopath victor friends. and those kids were sociopaths.

so this all plays across his face in ... the blankest expression ever bc he nat 20'd his bluff check. candid camera ain't gonna catch him not on point again tonight.]

[graveflowers]

The Grammys really need to police the kind of dickwads they invite to this shit.

[ she's just irritated because a. blade and b. she totally would have clapped had it been anyone aside from blade giving that speech. it wasn't bad, per se, objectively. if his call to arms hadn't been so anti... the entire world and humanity in general, really, and just anti-establishment and over-commercialization of the music industry as a whole. then it would have been great.

but blade. ]

But, I mean, they let Chris Brown perform. Twice.

[slay]

And lo and behold, this year, they managed to find someone even worse.

[ She had to speak up sometime. But yes raping his own daughter seems like it definitely slots him into the 'worse than Chris Brown' category. ]

[chessing]

[ ♬ take me to church/i put a spell on you - hozier/annie lennox

as the show goes on, jack takes a break from staring unimpressed at the stage to murmur: ] I think that's our cue to start trickling backstage.

[nothingsodivine]

[You don't have to tell Des twice. He stands up and begins meandering a bit across the aisles, muttering apologies under his breath as he goes. At least he found his grace and manages to make it through with a nat 20 dex. LIMBER LIKE A CAT.]

[slay]

[ Buffy is much less limber, but to be fair, she's in a dress. Her dex check of 13 does the job, tho, and she follows diligently after Des. ]