On Saturday, July 7th, Kabuki Street celebrates its most popular yearly festival - the summer Tanabata-matsuri!

Tanabata is an old Earth tradition that celebrates the deity Orihime reuniting with her lover Hikoboshi. According to legend, they are separated by a celestial river that runs through the heavens, and Tanabata is the single day each year that they can be together.

The Party Planning Committee has decorated Kabuki Street and organized events to celebrate!

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The Zama Shrine in Kabuki street will host a parade and ceremonial dance in honor of the festival.

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The entire district will be lined with stalls serving special festive foods such as takoyaki, taiyaki, dango and yakitori. Other stalls will be set up as booths offering games such as kingyo scooping, ring toss, and senbonbiki.

The delinquents of the Kabuki Street Rengou-kai are clad in colorful yukata throughout the festival, and will be putting on a play about their gang’s origins on Earth! According to legend, they fought bravely to conquer their school’s roof for a place to eat their horumonyaki in peace, and reigned over it for ten thousand years.

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The conclusion of the evening is a traditional contest of suikawari, followed by a grand fireworks show put on by award-winning Swiss pyrotechnics experts!

(( Feel free to post your outfits and your character attending the event to this thread! There will be live play for the event on the Rings of Discord server in the #city-square channel starting at 9 pm EDT! link ))

Saori had been at the festival since lunch time and joined Mai when she arrived later in the evening. She was glad to hold her hand during the fireworks after eating tremendously at the suikawari contest.

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Na-rae had been spending her time — when she isn't working, shopping, cooking, shopping, party planning, shopping (she likes to shop), sitting behind a sewing machine and working hard on a surprise for her wife. While she hadn't expected to be done before Tanabata, luck (and lack of sleep due to a horror movie marathon which kept her freaked over night) gave her extra time to put work into her gift. Many in Kabuki would choose to walk around in yukata, the Takamine's (not to be confused with the other Takamine's) would be putting on a more of a Little Korea flair! A more modern and mini-skirted version of hanbok. Perfect for warmer weather.

Na-rae's, of course, had to be a red shade, while Izumi's took on the gold a black fitting of a scheming Heavenly Queen.

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She had to buy a kimono specifically for this, mostly because none of her yukata at home fit currently. Primarily there for food, Jin ate whatever she could get her hands on. One of the watermelons even disappeared from the suikawari pile and likely didn't survive too long after that.

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At first Penny was resigned to just letting Mai handle picking out the perfect yukata for the festival when she tagged along with her and Saori to go shopping. But then she spotted one which was not only red, but had cranes and peonies on the fabric. There was no question the Wizard decided, this was certainly the perfect yukata for her.

“What’s going on out there"” Wade asked. With no formal schooling to keep him occupied, he spent every summer day hanging around Ed’s junk shop, helping and learning. He was well on his way to becoming a fine specimen of an engineer.

“Some stinking Earthen cultural festival,” growled Noodle, angrily twisting the wrench she was using to secure a few bolts. “Something Japanese I think.”

“Is that where you’re from"” the boy asked innocently.

“Don’t be dumb,” snarled Noodle. “Hell no. I’m from Long Island. Same as him.” She shook her wrench at Ed, who was soldering some small parts together.

“Minnesota, actually,” he corrected lightly without looking up from his work. He had his goggles pulled down over his eyes and was super concentrated on the task at hand.

“Yeah but you were in Long Island with the rest us before you came here, so it counts.”

“Mmph,” he grunted, more or less agreeably. There was really no point in arguing with Noodle. Not if you wanted to keep your skin in tact.

Ed’s workshop was located in the Kabuki Street district, right behind Saori’s garage. Eri had built it for him, when he was sure they were still friends, before he had messed things up with Trick. Admittedly it wasn’t his ideal location, but he was glad to have it over nothing. Business was even steady. There was always some manner of machine, large or small, that somebody was bringing in looking to be repaired. And he had even found the time on the side to restore his truck to pristine condition.

The truck which he had loaned to Goshen to pick up Polly, and was being parked outside the open maw of the garage right at that moment.

Ed shared an enormously happy smile with the circuits on the table before him. Even the arrival of his boyfriend couldn’t fully distract him from his work, but he found a place to pause and set aside his tools when he heard the crunch of Goshen’s shoes over the gravel of the drive. He tossed his goggles aside and wiped his hands clean on a rag, turning to rush out to hug him and drop a kiss on Polly’s brow. Goshen stole a kiss off Ed’s mouth, which only made him smile more, but then he turned to look back into the shop.

“Listen, Wade. We’re going to go watch the parades and wander around, if you want to come with us,” Ed offered.

“Can I really?” The boy jumped off the stool he’d been standing on to help pass tools to Noodle, abandoning her immediately in favor of an exciting adventure in a district he hadn’t had much freedom to explore, yet, solo.

“God please yes,” sighed Noodle, dramatically. “Get out of here.” She snapped a rag at him. The boy jumped with a laugh and scurried out of the garage.

They were an even mix of glam and grime. Goshen was, of course, dressed impeccably, and he had taken the liberty to dress Polly up in her cutest summer duds as well. He carried her balanced on his hip with his arm tucked around her, both protectively and supportingly. Ed and Wade, fresh from the shop, were covered in grit and grease. They were a fine dichotomy, and blended in well with the crowds of visitors.

On their excursion, they sampled all of the festival fare, all of it, sharing portions between the four of them. Ed and Polly’s favorite was the taiyaki, and they both went back for seconds. Goshen was more than happy to spoil the three of them rotten and bought them everything they wanted, which included some bizarrely shaped stuffed bunny type creature for Polly.

As soon as Wade saw people engaged in the suikiwari, he found someone in a fancy dress to ask a billion questions and begged to participate. Of course they let him have his fun smashing watermelons to bits, especially because it made Polly squeal and giggle with delight so much. Also, it was delicious.

They ended their day playing several games of kingyo over and over again and somehow managed to go home with a bowl of goldfish. It’s entirely probable that Ed stole it when nobody was looking.

The summer was getting a little boring without Nile to hang around with. That was Desdenova's excuse for retiring to his room and vegetating in the dark air conditioned coolness. It sounded better than 'it is so hot that the pavement is no longer a solid'.

But the notices for the Tanabata Festival popped up on Desdenova's news feed. He thought it over. It looked like fun, and he adored Eri and Izumi, and Mallory was uber cool, and he knew they'd be there, plus the rest of the delinquents.

Sadly, though, Nile was trapped in one of the most horrible structures ever created: the family summer vacation. Desdenova texted her anyhow, intending to plot a way to spring her. As it happened, Nile was nigh onto murdering her brothers, so, after a call from Pharlen to her mother, Desdenova was able to grab Daisy and go rescue the maiden fair.

They arrived early with all the mischief to make, peeling through the games with glee, and usually handing off any prizes won to littler kids, so they wouldn't have their hands full. Daisy gave up on keeping tabs on them and simply retired to the Zama Shrine to meditate. She figured if the pair did anything all that bad, the incident would be quickly telegraphed to the spirits of the shrine.

About an hour before the delinquent's play began, Desdenova cheerfully purchased a used flat screen TV from a pawn shop and left it randomly near the stage. Nile and Desdenova then sat to watch, cheering on the girls as they fought the brave battle of the rooftop.

Then, of course, they disappeared around a corner. Soon, the abandoned TV was spitting static and hissing. A mysterious figure with long dark hair appeared randomly. Then another strange figure. The scene bounced one to the other, the eerie images coming closer and closer....

Until, with the shriek of horrified electronics, Samira...?? crawled from the screen. Followed by Cthulhu. A very small one with colorful face tentacles.

Desdenova cackled happily as he shook back black hair, but Nile was having too much fun with the tie-thulu to remove them. A good dozen ties were fastened around her face. They took a bow and went zooming back into the crowd.

They peeled through much of the street food, having managed to save one of Nile's uncle's potions which allowed her to eat everything without barfing. Finally they settled down to watch the fireworks, parked on a wall, heads tilted upwards.

Daisy finally tracked the pair down and returned them home.