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thequaranmeme2019-08-17 07:49 pm
quarantinemod) wrote in thequaranmeme2019-08-17 07:49 pm
Entry tags:
test drive meme: august 2019
about the tdm
○ The monthly test drive memes are considered game canon, so anything in the TDM is actually happening in the game setting. All Test Drive Meme threads are eligible to be used for activity check.
○ While writing prompts are provided, the Quarantine's setting is very flexible, so feel free to head in different directions. If you're planning on doing something big, please contact me so I can help out!
○ There are currently 100 character spots available.
○ RESERVES are currently OPEN.
○ APPLICATIONS will open on September 1, 2019, at 9:00 PM PST.
○ While writing prompts are provided, the Quarantine's setting is very flexible, so feel free to head in different directions. If you're planning on doing something big, please contact me so I can help out!
○ There are currently 100 character spots available.
○ RESERVES are currently OPEN.
○ APPLICATIONS will open on September 1, 2019, at 9:00 PM PST.
prompts
i. hungry & tired
You could have been anywhere when it happened - asleep and lost in dreams, packing up to head home from a trip, fighting the biggest battle of your life, drunk and dancing at the club - but wherever you were, you felt...out of place. Like you didn't belong. Whether it was a flash of a feeling after a friend doesn't pick up your phone call, or a lifelong ache borne of being the last of your species, the Portal heard you, felt you. And in the space of a blink, you find yourself stumbling out of a glowing circle of light that moves like living liquid, at the top of a set of slate steps.
First, the heat and humidity hits you in the face like a brick, so heavy it's almost tangible in the air, and the smell of petrichor lingers in your nostrils. A moment later, it hits you that you're hungry, absolutely ravenous, and your limbs are heavy with exhaustion, as if you've been walking for days. There's the sounds of life all around you, birdsong, the chirping of insects, and...voices?
You're not the only one to have just arrived in this alien jungle, and if you manage to make it down the natural slate steps without falling, you'll find yourself walking toward a heavy-duty metal trunk with a busted lock and a well-worn path at the edge of the clearing that winds off into the jungle. Looking behind yourself, you see the portal, glowing blue, surrounded by what looks like bone, with tendrils of ectoplasmic nerve endings winding into the stone and plantlife around it. Then the portal flashes almost blindingly bright for a moment, and someone else is stumbling out of it. Will you help them? Leave them to their own devices? And what's in that box...?
ii. the monsoon & the shrine
About halfway through your walk from the portal down that path that leads to the settlement area, the humidity breaks and the petrichor delivers on its promise - as if the sky opened up above you, rain starts to fall in thick sheets that drench you in minutes.
Continuing down the path will lead to the edge of the river, where a relatively sturdy wooden bridge crosses the river to a large island, where the top of a stone structure is barely visible through the sheets of greenish-grey rain. Considering the only other shelter is the large leaves of some nearby plants, it looks like the best option to get out of the rain, dried off, and to regroup. And maybe, hopefully, find some food?
This is the Shrine: a stone group dwelling where characters will find the remains of a communal garden with some edible vegetables and berries available to partially sate their hunger, a pond, and circular staircase leading up into the home units, where the rock furniture and floor are heated and perfect to dry clothing on while characters regroup. Feel free to look around and see what you can find...it's obvious the original residents aren't here to care about you invading their homes.
iii. shadow knows
Curious about why there were no people here, and then suddenly an influx? Characters might not know it yet, but this is what happens when the Portal has a nightmare - a burst of new arrivals, torrential rainfall, and crazy winds. Anyone seeking shelter in the Shrine will hear the howling wind, though the structure stands firm, protected by the ledges of stone around it and the thick stone walls.
Anyone hunkering down in the Shrine, or even anyone still out braving the rain, will start to notice that the shadows seem oddly deep and thick. Out of the corners of their eyes, characters might see movement in a dark corner, and when they turn to really look at it, there's nothing there. Nothing but the shadows. As the day goes on, though, and the rainstorm keeps up, the shadows start to get thicker and deeper, and characters will start to notice flickers of movement much more often. Soon, they notice that the shadows are creeping in, twisting tendrils of darkness that creep across floors and along walls until they've closed in only a few feet from the nearest source of light. Anyone brave enough to put part of their body into the shadows will see that part of themselves disappear almost completely into the darkness, impossible to see - and impossible to feel. Who knows if your body would even still exist if you fell into the shadows, and could you find your way home?
Characters will quickly discover that the safest way to cut through the darkness, to push it back, to keep themselves from being swallowed whole is to make physical skin-to-skin contact with another person. Whoever's nearby, better grab them by the hand, because they've now become your safety blanket.
iv. the book of life
Once the shadows dispel at the break of dawn, characters can feel safe enough to explore the Shrine a little more freely now that their clothing is dry and they've got a bit of food in their bellies. Rifling through the rooms will be mostly unfruitful. They'll find clothing that falls to dust as soon as it's touched and little personal knick-nacks from the previous residents of the Shrine.
But exploring and rifling around isn't entirely useless, because someone is sure to find a strangely heavy, leatherbound book in the drawer of one of dwellings in the upper inner ring of the Shrine that miraculously doesn't crumble to dust when touched. The cover has strange symbols on it, but characters will find they're able to read it through translation magic - The Book of Life. While it might seem from the outside like some kind of religious text or something, when it's opened, characters will find the messy scribbled notes of a previous resident who was obviously a naturalist. The book details some of the resident plant and animal life, and (very fortunately for these new arrivals) includes which plants are poisonous, edible, or good to use for medicine. Likewise, it explains which of the common creatures around are good to hunt and eat, or will attack at random, or can be carefully tamed into a pet.
Of course, the book is old and probably out-of-date, since the Portal has opened and shut to a lot of worlds since then, but it's a great place to start.
[Mod Note: The Book of Life will contain whatever information is put up in the Bestiary and Flora pages, which should be up and running later tonight with some initial info. The book will need to be updated as characters discover new plants and animals and learn about them.]
v. is anyone there?
The box that residents ran into near the Portal contained a variety of walkie-talkie radios that characters could power up and create a username on, which broadcast audio only with no privacy settings.
Looking for someone to explore with? Calling for help? Need someone to talk to or to find someone to touch in the shadows? That's what the radios are for! Give them a try.
no subject
Still, Tooi makes a noncommittal sound, holds the 1/4th eaten cucumber in his mouth, and starts to take some of the vegetables, using his hands to rub the dirt off in the constant stream of rain.
He can't really talk with a cucumber in his mouth, but at least he seems willing to help?]
no subject
Ay! Can I borrow your shirt?
[ She makes sure to throw in the batted lashes, the little pout. Just for a second, though; she's busy de-griming a tomato. ]
Por favor. Can't really use mine, you know?
no subject
Wha' foh?
["What for?", he asks, around the cucumber.]
no subject
[ Oops. Sombra already got a stern talking-to about her language. She's going to have to get a swear jar or something if she wants to make it out here in Sesame Jungle. ]
I mean, pretty please. I'll let you get the first bite of my abuelita's sopita de fideo. Ah? Sounds real good right now, don't it?
no subject
Also, shit isn't a bad word, it's fine. He's heard worse.]
'Kay.
[So how do you want him to do this, pull the end up and make it kind of like a shirt sling or what]