October 2022 Test Drive Meme

[folkie]

OCTOBER 2022 TDM

INTRODUCTION

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Welcome to Folkmore's monthly Test Drive Meme! Please feel free to test drive any and all characters regardless of your intent to apply or whether you have an invite or not.

All TDMs are game canon. You can choose to have your TDM thread be your introduction thread upon acceptance or start fresh. Each TDM will provide a scenario for how characters arrive in-game that particular month.

Playing TDMs will allow characters to immediately obtain canon items from homes especially weapons or other things they may have had on their person when they were pulled from their worlds! There will always be a prompt that provides some sort of "reward" to characters who complete certain tasks.

Current players are allowed to have in-game characters react to TDMs via the Network or make a log with the prompts. Current players are always encouraged to tag new people on the TDM!

TDM threads can be used for spoon spending at any time by characters accepted into the game.

[ Prompt One ★ Prompt Two]

SHINING

Content Warnings: Possible insanity via freezing. Temporary nullification of abilities.

COLD AS YOU

You were falling...

The world snaps into place all at once; you are laying on the ground, surrounded on all sides by towering bushes that stretch up towards a beautiful sunset sky. The bushes were clearly flowered at one point, but now the flowers have died and all that remains are browning leaves that are beginning to fall. On the chill air you can sometimes hear the sound of music, too faint to completely determine.

As you stand, you are filled with an intense desire to find someone. You might have an idea of who, but chances are you do not - you just know that somewhere ahead of you is someone that you need to reach. Whether they are friend or lover or enemy remains to be seen.

You wander the maze. If you're the impatient type and you have the ability, you might try to fly out but you will simply be vaulted right back down if you do. Something clearly expects you to play by rules which were never actually explained. As you move through the twisting passages of nature, you will notice that there is a frost creeping along the branches on either side of you. This frost brings a deep chill with it, and it encourages you to move faster, to find that nameless person now now now! If you take a very long time to wander the maze you may very well be on the verge of freezing and half mad with the desire to find someone. If you try to force your way through the bushes, the frost will crawl over your limbs and inspire both the freezing and near madness at once.

When you find your Person, the cold evaporates. The air suddenly feels merely crisp, and the leaves on the bushes seem more vibrant. The two of you now can focus on finding the way out - so much easier now - but any sense of urgency will have passed and you may just walk for hours, talking and sharing things about yourselves.

It is possible to solve the maze alone, but it is much easier (and more pleasant!) with someone else.

KEEP YOUR BRITTLE HEART WARM

When you exit the hedge maze you will find a stunning display of lights: hundreds of candles and lanterns decorate the ground and hang from trees, illuminating a clear path over a gently sloping hill. When you crest the hill you can look down and see a beautiful hot spring sprawled out below. It too is lit up by hundreds of lights, all of them glowing under the late autumn sky as it darkens towards night. There are changing rooms where you can stash your clothes (yes, there are bathing suits for the very shy) and bathing stations to ensure that you are clean before entering.

The water of the springs soothes madness and heals physical injuries or any frostbite that may have been sustained in the maze. It also relaxes you, making you perhaps more likely to open up to anybody else present.

The hot spring is staffed by many mice. They don't speak, but they squeak to one another in such a way that it sounds like they are singing - high lilting chants that seem to promise that everything will be okay. They are happy enough to band together to bring you towels or hot tea. The spring is open 24/7, always with lights to fight the cold and darkness of winter.

HIGH STRANGENESS

Content Warnings: Monster sighting, optional violence.

GLITCH

Folkmore has trains and of course the cat bus, but it also has roads, mostly utilized by horses and bicycles. Maybe you're looking for the convivence store, or maybe you just like walking. However it happens, you find yourself on a lonely road at dusk. It is unusually quiet, almost as if the world is holding its breath.

Suddenly you hear the sound of wings. A man-sized creature soars above you, something with huge red glowing eyes. It drops something at your feet: a walkie-talkie. The creature lands some distance away, staring at you, and a thought arises unbidden in your mind:

Help them.

The walkie crackles and you can hear someone speaking, asking if anyone is there. It is another Star Child, brought into this trial as well. They are in danger somewhere nearby; maybe stuck on the edge of a cliff, or trapped on a rope bridge - whatever it is, they need someone else to help them get to safety. If they have any powers, they have been temporarily nullified, but if the rescuer has powers they remain intact. That's where you come in! Using the walkie you must communicate with one another so that the rescuer can reach the person in trouble in time!

But what if you don't make it in time? Or decide that you're not the hero type? Well. The rescue-ee will suffer a terrible fate... for a few seconds. Then the entire world fuzzes and resets, but this time the roles have been reversed. Both parties will remember what has already happened, so if you just ran off into the woods with no intent of helping the first time you miiiight get your just desserts! This process will repeat over and over, people switching sides every time, until someone is finally rescued or the sun rises. Whichever comes first!

If you do succeed at a rescue, you will hear the rustle of huge wings once more. This time you don't see the mysterious creature, but you will find a mystery trunk. Inside you will each find some of your canon clothes and a canon item. Looks like teamwork is rewarded! Nearby, there will also be some unenchanted weapons sticking out of the ground: basic swords, guns, shields, etc.

BAD OMEN

You don't necessarily have to have completed the rescue trial to get some goodies, though! Those aforementioned weapons are scattered all over Folkmore. But if you just go to grab any of them you'd better be prepared to fight; after all, nothing comes for free!

As soon as you have pulled a weapon out of the ground, a tall, man in a black suit and hat will appear from seemingly nowhere and attack you. He has no weapons but he is extremely strong. He's also just really creepy - his face looks like it might be fake, somehow. The only way he can be killed is with a wound to the heart - any other supposedly mortal injury will result in another man in black appearing. It is possible for someone with no combat training to beat these creatures, but they really might appreciate a little help from someone with more experience!

The good news is that they won't mess up your clothes any, as none of these creatures bleed. Because that is totally normal.

Good luck!

Comments

[toomuchinfo]

She's not quite sure what she said, but she figures maybe it was wrong? After all, her love life was kind of a contentious one with pretty much all of her friends.

So it's a genuine surprise when she finds out Lila's here. "Really. Huh. That's weird. Not a bad thing, but weird. Bonding through Wardens going crazy followed by the Fade makes things weird by default. Add in fucking Corypheus and it's like, wow, friends forever!"

"Awww! Look at 'em! Using teamwork and everything. I never thought I'd say this, but I wish I'd been leading mice. They'd probably argue way less." And/or not blow up a Chantry. She'd take what she could get. "Sooooo. Thirteen's, like, everywhere? The mice are secretly Thirteen and she's getting a good look at me naked? 'Cause I'm not sure I'm okay with that."

Sarajane at least looked perfectly human. If it wasn't for the weird, small and coiled black horns peeking out of her hair. Or the claws where her fingernails used to be. At least the claws were black, she'd save a fortune on nail treatments.

"Elera? She's the other Lavellan here and wow, that sounds strange. Do the two of you get along at least? And...other Hawkes, too. It's probably asking too much that one of them managed to save Carver and Bethany." And she looks sad for a brief moment.

[maserannas]

Ellana more had no real stakes or understandings of even the love life of the Hawke she knew; as far as she was concerned, more happiness to all those who managed to keep loved ones in their lives, and who also didn't have to worry about betrayals and other such nonsense. More than the smaller, domestic ways, like she'd thought her own life was facing until the depths of it paced ahead of her not so long ago.

"To be fair," she says, offering a lazy smile, "From the moment of the Breach onward, with the amount of nonsense happening, Corypheus finally being squashed and prevented from leaping bodies was almost anticlimactic, but still incredibly satisfying." He deserved worse, if there was such a thing, but apparently even the void was a place things could come back from.

She has many, many questions about the tenants of the stories of her faith, these days.

Ellana's eyes open again, and she shifts, turning to watch the direction the mice disappeared in again.

"I don't know... generally, I think the Spirit Folk are themselves. Thirteen allows them in her realm, and they stay for as long as they like, then move on. Or that's what I've heard from the ones I've chatted with at the markets."

She shoots Sarajane a crooked smile, vaguely apologetic.

"Can't be sure of it, of course. She can definitely hear or see whatever she feels like, but I don't think she finds us all that fascinating all the time. Thankfully." Now, fascinating at specific times? She suspects that's a yes, for better and worse.

The question about Sarajane's family, on the other hand, gives her pause. She shakes her head, slowly. "I do, with Elera, but as far as the Hawke I know... she never mentioned a Bethany. Carver is alive, and with the wardens, she mentioned that." Bethany hadn't made it to the sea for the voyage to Kirkwall. There was nothing pleasant in having to admit as much to a woman that there were parts of her family that hadn't been saved in Ellana's world, either. "I can't speak for Elera. There's some world out there where it must be the case, but it wasn't mine. My condolences."

[toomuchinfo]

Her relationship with Seb was comfortable and a comfort both, he was so kind and understanding. And he knew her faults and loved her anyway. Add in being willing to stand up to his nobles and say yes, he loved and was going to marry an apostate mage and she couldn't help counting herself lucky.

"Seriously? Now I'm sad that I didn't get to see it, if only to point and laugh at him when he got squished. Maybe mock him a little, too, just for fun," Hawke said with a laugh.

She knew Seb was fully devoted to Andraste, but Hawke had her doubts. It was one of those 'agree to disagree' things.

"So if they're not Thirteen, I want the mice to stick around for a long time. I've never heard of happy, friendly, singing mice before and how does this thing work to take video," she said waving her relic. "Carver's never gonna believe this and I want more evidence so I can gloat."

"Good. 'Cause I'm not really into the idea of being watched all the time. Not anymore. I'm even having a problem with some of the time, but that's probably a me thing." Definitely a her thing.

"...oh. Yeah. Carver's a Grey Warden for me, too. I guess it's asking too much that Bethany survived. She's--she was the kindest and bravest in her own way person I've ever known. And I'd say that even if I wasn't her big sister." Who failed Bethany entirely. And so did another Hawke. It wasn't fair.