♥ October 2019 TEST DRIVE MEME

[hugtopiamods]

October (Lasohm) Test Drive Meme
Premise ♥ Setting ♥ Rules ♥ FAQ ♥ Mod Contact

Havenwell is normally a beautiful city - all tall spires and pure white stone glistening with gold against a blue sky. Now, it's still quite lovely, but it's marred. The wall that surrounds the city has a large glimmering hole broken through the stone and the buildings are missing bits and pieces here and there. The city is still reeling from the aftermath of its siege when a new set of souls are drawn to its shore. Good luck, new arrivals; and please excuse all the dust.

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❥ PROMPT I: Buddy System

With all the changes and the fear of a secondary attack lingering, the natives are a lot more protective of their newest arrivals. When new characters begin to appear at the temples, they receive the welcome speech, get their communicators and the simple map of the city, and a warning to stay away from the walls. Then they get taken to the front of the temple by a helpful robotic priest. Rather than turn the newcomers loose right away, they pull someone seemingly at random off the street and push the two people together with a cheerful, "It's dangerous to go alone, so please show our newest resident around. Please be buddies!" They wait until they're certain the pair is going to be moving off together before going back inside.

They try to place a new arrival with one of those who previously arrived, but who can keep track of all that, right? Characters may find themselves thrown together with an actual veteran or with another new arrival who only came here a day or even just an hour before them! Good luck helping each other out, offworlders, and don't lose your buddy!

❥ PROMPT II: The Havenwell Archives

Lasohm is another month that belongs to Ohma and after such a vicious attack, a small group of citizens decide that it might be great for the offworlders to help with something important to the feline god. These citizens are marked with a sash with the sign of a quill on it, a decidedly antique symbol considering how technologically advanced the people are. They hand out fliers to any who will take them, offering a small amount of Dora in compensation to any who will help the Havenwell Archives repair, catalogue, and restore any books damaged by the attack.

The Archives is a large building in the south and its doors, which have been sealed shut until now, are slightly ajar, allowing people entry. Head to the Archives and you'll be greeted by one of a handful of robotic citizens, all wearing that quill-emblazoned sash, and directed to a small room where you and other offworlders are put to the task of reassembling history texts that have fallen into disrepair or reviewing work that earlier offworlders completed, fixing any glitches that might occur in the text. Most of the writing is illegible, but it seems that these books are important to the Archives for more than just the information contained within. As you work, you might notice that talking and sharing information about yourself or engaging in physical contact near these books with the other people in your room makes the text on your pages a little more legible, a little easier to read and understand, and easier to fix.

❥ PROMPT III: Virtual Research

After the attack, every part of the city is on repair duty and the means the Entertainment District as well. As new arrivals wander the city, they might be called into one of the numerous Virtual Reality cafes. These cafes vary in layout, but most have areas for the natives to plug directly into the machines and other areas which have older looking virtual reality helmets that allow flesh bodied people experience the games. For those who need assistance with their sensory inputs, basic options like audio descriptions of visual scenes, enhanced audio and descriptive speech, closed captions, and crude mobility chairs are available. A handful of cafes have other options like direct visual or audio cortex stimulation to simulate vision or hearing, or suspension tanks to allow simulated movement, but these are currently unavailable due to damage.

All of these facilities are, unfortunately, under repair. The direct plug-in systems are easier for the robot natives to fix because they can do the most important part of it - testing - by themselves. But for the helmets and other interface systems, they need your help. Naturally, they'll pay you for the work, but they need the offworlders to play the available games and record any areas where they find glitches. Playing with a partner increases your chances of finding and fixing any issues, so feel free to log in for free for once and test any of the following games:

• Big Bass Fishing
The beautiful lake has blue-green waters surrounded by forest and rocky, reedy shores. You and your companion are on a small single-motor fishing boat and you have fishing gear - two poles in the water. As the game starts up a read-out announces the objective: Catch the largest fish before the time limit ends. What's the time limit? ...Well, that's your first glitch because it reads as static. Might as well start fishing though, right? It doesn't take long to catch a few regular sized fish, nothing too exciting, and then? You get the big one - it bows your fishing rod nearly in half as you reel it up. The fish leaps into the air and you realize this is your next glitch because the fish hangs there - the size of a minivan - and yells, "BIG. BASS. FISHING. ATTACK." The fish slaps its fins and tails at the boat and now you and your fishing companion better fight this fish or you'll end up in the lake or worse.


• A (un)Familiar Experience
Jump into the life of the temple familiars and see life from their perspective! Choose the temple, any temple is fine, and be transformed into a fledgling rainbow dragon, a purple mouse, a white raven, or a blue feline. You're free to move about the virtual confines of the temples and, in fact, you can even interact with other familiars in their temples - who may be other players in this game. Play, climb, try to get your fledgling wings to fly, tumble about with the other mice, enjoy your simple life as an animal! --or you would if you weren't an insane size. Rather than being a small mouse, you're the size of a horse. That fledgling rainbow dragon? About the size of a fly. The building sizes are off, too - one might have door that's 30 feet tall, but a ceiling that's only 12. Everything else seems fine, but those sizes? Well, you better figure out how to get around that.


• Robot Crossing
Logging in with another character will net you a little farm and a variety of games to choose from:
1. Pick and harvest as many Aellyn vegetables and fruits as you can before the timer runs out! The more you pick, the better your score. Work together with your partner to clear the field in any way you can. Strangely, once you finish clearing a tree or a field row of their bounty, they seem to magically refill when you turn your back. Strangely, when the timer runs out? It flashes 00:00 and the game...doesn't? Stop? In fact, the fruits and vegetables just keep multiplying and multiplying and if you don't hurry up you might just get buried in them all!
   
2. With a partner, use the giant slingshot to launch comically large fruits into a garden patch of other colored fruits. Match a line of 3 or more similarly shaped fruits to clear it from the field. The more fruits you can clear, the higher your score - aka welcome to Fruit Crush. Stack lines of 6 or more to get shining clear diamond fruits that clear the entire row and snag yourself some bonus points. Or they should, but whenever you clear away a matching set, the fruits explode, sending fruit bits and juice everywhere - most notably on you and your partner. Still, the game is going on and it looks like it won't stop until you finish, so good thing it's all a computer game, right? Sure feels real though - reeeeeeally sticky.
   
3. You and your partner(s) are given a magical golden pumpkin and it's your job to grow it into the largest pumpkin possible. Why? There's a county fair of course and the largest pumpkin wins! But how do you grow this pumpkin? Well, for whatever reason? This pumpkin is already the size of a grizzly bear and it just won't stop growing! You and your partner better find a way to stop it from growing out of control or you might get (virtually) crushed! You could do a song and dance routine together to touch the pumpkin's soul to teach it moderation or calm its insane vegetable puberty. You could hold hands and share stories and entertain the pumpkin until it feels satisfied that it's grown enough. You could just hack and slash at it in an attempt to reduce its unwieldy bulk. The possibilities are endless and so is the pumpkin's growth, so you better hurry!

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Have fun however you like with the setting! Make a network post, make up other prompts based on the general setting, go wild. Havenwell is your oyster.

This TDM is for the November application round. If you have any questions, feel free to direct them to the FAQ or to the Mod Question thread below. The reservation round begins on October 30, 2019 at 10:00PM EST and our applications will run from November 2, 2019 to November 9, 2019 from 10:00PM EST to 10:00PM EST.

♥ Taken Characters ♥ Reservations ♥ Applications ♥

Comments

[meridio]

[ When, indeed. His gaze drifts to their joined hands. Now, if he wants to be technical, though they shouldn't be doing this. ]

That matters not.

[ Touch is touch. Whatever significance she might ascribe to the answer, he was never so sentimental as to count the days for something like that. Her first, his nth—it doesn't matter. ]

The gods desire touch. They will have it.

[pyrafect]

[ That matters not-- words of someone who is duty-bound, placing a directive far above what they feel and, also, quite easily a deflection. She understands, being what she is. However, she thinks, he shouldn't have to suffer for it; perhaps she can make this hand-holding experience as idly pleasant as possible for him. ]

Then... walk with me, Somnus.

[ She releases one of his hand to be by her side, while the other still keeps his in hers. Pyra steps away, distancing themselves, but through their joined hands tugs him along.

She continues, a joking tone light on her tongue: ] How to hold hands... we'll learn how to perfect this by the end of the day.

[meridio]

[ The city is new to him yet. Walking while they remain in contact will afford him the advantage of committing their surroundings to memory. Voicing no complaint, he allows himself to be tugged along, ever just a step behind her. ]

Have you seen the city?

1/3

[pyrafect]

Hardly any of it, save for the wall. [ Can one explore an entire city in one day?  ] The first order of business would be to find where any of us might be stay...ing...

[ A beat.

She glances at him.

He sure is walking a step behind her. ]

[pyrafect]

[ She giggles again. If they continue like this, they'll look not unlike a mother trailing a child along! How silly would that be? ]

[pyrafect]

[ Thus, stopping once more, she turns to look at him and gives him one more encouraging tug. ]

I did say.... walk with me.

[ She doesn't bite, promise! Or does she smell... is that why he's distant...

But, hey, this is hand-holding 101 while walking: walk together, not dragging the other along! ]

[meridio]

[ She smells great. Divine, in fact.

How silly he looks is the least of his worries, and such a concern is beneath a being like Pyra, who nevertheless wishes to walk as equals. At that last tug, he finally steps forth. ]

The city centers. [ He cranes his neck in the rough direction of said center. ] That is where we must go.

[pyrafect]

[ Satisfied that he's finally walking beside her LIKE A NORMAL PERSON, she sets forth. ] "The Marshes"... that's what someone [ rando NPC ] had mentioned to me for housing. They're townhouses, mostly...

[ Down the steps they go. ] There is no one else here from my world, as far as I know. [ Which is something she'd prefer, as she's fairly certain most that she knows of her world are either dead or want her dead. Or to use her. Her safest bet as of this moment is to remain as unassuming as possible. ] So an entire townhouse would be, ah, so large just for one person! There's bound to be smaller options.

[ She smiles. ] Maybe you'll be luckier. [ Finding someone from his own world, she means-- and she says as much because she assumes most would want to have someone from their world here. ]

[meridio]

[ If he's lucky, it'll only be his brother and they'll never cross paths for as long as they're both here. ]

Those are but accommodations for sleeping and eating. I will share the space with any.

[ No longer is he a spirit manifested as he once appeared. Now that he'll require sleep and sustenance again, his time to serve will be drastically reduced. That doesn't mean he'll be spending all day indoors.

Pyra shared a living space with another well enough in Chroma, assigned or no. (As far as he knows, he never met anyone from her world that time.) Given the choice, he wonders, will she hesitate to do the same here? ]

[pyrafect]

Oh, in that case, would you like to board together?

[ Ab s o fucki n g l u t l e y she would want to room with someone!!! Holy hell, she's been sealed for five hundred years with no one but herself (technically speaking, but also not technically, but also technically^{it's complicated}. So, she asks the question before she can even stop herself to consider things...

Like.

That he is a total stranger.

That she knows nothing about him.



But look how excited and hopeful she looks at him to say yes! ]

[meridio]

[ And that, even in the modern era, there's still something known as propriety. Somnus was never known for his etiquette, though. Neither is he in the position nor have a reason to refuse Pyra.

Already knowing his answer, he gives her a cursory glance. ]

Very well. I have no preference as to the place.

[ She can choose the house. All he needs is a single room for himself. ]

[pyrafect]

[ Don't think she didn't notice how he brushed the idea of rooming with others from his world, whether or not they're here...

...But for the moment, her excitement has gotten the better of her. With a little more enthusiasm to her step, she continues with him towards the city center. ] Oh-- oh, let's find one with a working kitchen!

[ Even since awakening five hundred years ago, for that one year she had walked upon the earth it had been nothing but inns after inns at which to stay, followed by camping out in the wildness upon the Titan's backs or within their bellies. Addam's manor had never been a home for the brief nights she had stayed there, what with the war. The ship in which she had been sank-- the casket in which she had been sealed-- the tomb... had been far more a home to her than anything else.

And if the place has a kitchen, it will be the first time she's ever cooked, the knowledge of how-to inherently granted to her upon being constructed. ] Maybe with an oven and gas stoves, and... [ He can stop her any time. ]

[meridio]

[ Who is he to stop her?

If she knows how to use those things, all the more power to her. He doesn't—not anything with electricity involved, anyway. His knowledge of modern technology is limited to the basics, most of which were acquired from distant observation. ]

I do not imagine there will be significant disparities between the houses.

[ They're being handed out to newcomers for free. The furnishing is bound to be the same, if not identical, across the lot. ]

1/2

[pyrafect]

I suppose you're right.

[ And, honestly, she isn't really one for doing something creative like decorating....

But maybe he is? ]

[pyrafect]

Do you have any style, in terms of decoration or furniture, you would prefer?

[ And this is asked with a... not so subtle look over him and what he wears. If he has some sort of style, era, or culture from which he comes, she can't identify it. ]

[meridio]

[ Even in his world, the style with which he's familiar has long gone out of trend. A taste of what once was isn't why he's here, so he shakes his head once. ]

I leave the matter of the house to you. All I ask is a single room.

[ After existing in a separate space for thousands of years, he remembers that this much should be the bare minimum. ]

[pyrafect]

[ She's not going to be decorating it at all like her own world, so. Looks like their place is going to be as bare as bricks. But for him, she can certainly try to make it more, oh, homey? A little. ]

Then... how about... [ Thinking. ] What is your favorite color? [ Glancing at him. ]

[meridio]

[ Definitely not blue. ]

Any will suffice. I do not expect to be there much.

[ He'll only have what he needs. If the house should be missing what he does need, he'll provide for himself. Either way, the decor shouldn't be an issue. ]

[pyrafect]

[ Their decor is going to either be non-existent or as awful as how either of them dresses. The world is beautiful, yes, but anywhere outside of their hypothetical future apartment.

But there he goes again, acting as if his opinions-- his input, in this case-- doesn't matter. Just like his feelings on how serving these new gods through touch.

So, she encourages: ] ...It should have a piece of you there. That's important. [ Why is it important? Probably because one of her human companions had said so, five hundred years ago. ] Something to show that you're.... here.

[ Hm. What could work, what could work...? ]

...You find the world beautiful. [ There. A start. And then, the next words come more easily: ] If you plan on going out to the city, [ Her hand, linked with his, sways as she walks. ] why don't you find something you think is beautiful... and bring it back?

[meridio]

[ At least Somnus is wearing enough clothes to cover himself—

She assigns him a fruitless exercise. Now, more than ever, he rejects materialism, and all that this technological city has to offer are materials. Knowing that this is no fault of hers, he neither accepts nor rejects the suggestion while they continue to walk hand in hand. ]

What is your plan?

[ This city needs no piece of him. Once he's served his purpose, he will disappear back to his world as if he'd never existed.

While he's here, however, he will explore Aellyn as much as he's able. Will she do the same? ]

[pyrafect]

[ yah but he is pantless TAKE THAT TOGA BOI

Also, believing that he's still talking about going out and finding something beautiful: ]

I can't be the one that decides that for you. [ She taps just left and lower of the crystal upon her chest, where a heart would be. ] That's all in here.

[meridio]

[ Like what she's wearing qualifies as proper pants!!

In other words, that decision is for him to make. He never did find out what that crystal is. ]

After the house, what will you do?

1/2

[pyrafect]

[ then give her ur cloak dummy so she can properly cover herself!! you'll be doing the whole world a favor!

She realizes what he meant just before... and that he doesn't seem so keen on fulfilling the little quest. Avoidant little thing, isn't he? She looks at him, and looks at him with such a look that clearly says beeech ur subject-change wasn't subtle... only more eloquently.

Well. She decides to challenge him with this new topic. ]

[pyrafect]

What do you think is most important to do, in this world?

[meridio]

[ The look she gives him is telling, and Somnus is not blind to it as he gives her a sideways glance. They've done this many a time in the past, after all. ]

To do what must be done.