Entry tags:

*tdm

December 2023 & January 2024 Test Drive Meme

December 2023 - January 2024 TDM

Introduction

Overflow TDM post found here

[ TDM Questions ★ Jump to Comments ★ Full Navigation ]
This Test Drive meme is open to all.
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 and work like "mini-events". For new players and characters, you can choose to have your TDM thread be your introduction thread upon acceptance or start fresh. Current players are also allowed to have in-game characters post to the TDM so long as they mark their top levels ‘Current Character.’

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

Playing and interacting with the 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 always encouraged to tag new people on the TDM!

🦊 New Star Children meet the Fox still in their worlds, and she brings them into the new realm of Folkmore. As you follow her, your body begins to change and new characteristics emerge. These may stay for a while, or perhaps they will hide away after. And during all of this, the Fox explains to you where you will be going: to Folkmore.

and then... you fall like a shooting star, falling to the land in a burst of starlight.

🦊 Experienced Star Children are already familiar with this time of the month. There are shooting stars all across the sky, and some fall to the land, which means the Fox has brought new arrivals. These newly arrived Star Children will face some tests, but Thirteen wants the more seasoned residents to participate as well.

Perhaps you follow the falling stars on your own, or perhaps the Fox simply teleports you there, but it appears you too will be part of this.

[ Prompt One ★ Prompt Two]

Thirteen Knows What You Did Last Summer . ★

Content Warnings: School Detention, Time Not Passing, Forced Reflection/Confession, Potential Violence

Welcome to detention. Star Children, whether they're new arrivals to Folkmore or old hands, find themselves sitting at two person desks in a library. Perhaps there's only two Star Children, perhaps up to four or five. Regardless, each Star Child has a slip of paper in their hands which spells out why they are in detention, a secret detention slip no one else can read. Which, whew, because the reason any Star Child is in detention is for something they've never been punished for, something they might reasonably have thought they got away with, something they know was wrong.

The door to the library opens, and Kuma Lisa enters. She explains that Star Children will be in detention for four hours, and by the end of detention, they will need to reflect on what they did and express contrition. The headmistress gives no further guidance before leaving and closing the doors behind her.

Four hours is a notable chunk of time, but it's not so long, is it? Surely it's possible to wait it out without making good on the assignment… Or perhaps it's enough to write about it in one of the notebooks on the table in front of each student, without explaining it to another soul. Star Children are welcome to try whatever they want. However, they may notice an oddity with the clock. Namely, no matter how many times the second hand ticks around a circle to mark a whole minute, the minute and hour hands don't progress. It's the same minute over and over and over—

Detention is four hours, but how long four hours takes is entirely up to the Star Children in detention. Read every book in the library. Throw a dance party. Get high. Pull weapons out of the books. All matter of non-magical weapons. Nothing immediately happens upon pulling those weapons—no monsters to make detention less boring. Unless people make progress reflecting on their transgression, communicating about it with another Star Child, and showing penitence for it, time won't pass. Reality warps to stay in the same minute, minute after minute, hour after hour.

What's it going to be? Never ending detention or personal accountability?

However long it takes, it only takes four hours in the realm of Folkmore.

A word of warning to those who grabbed weapons, they will be attacked on their way home after detention. They will be attacked by creatures out of storybooks. Star Children will need to know the literary weaknesses of these creatures, good luck, or the help of someone else coming along who does know their weaknesses. At least there's some excitement in the day after four long long hours.

🦊 Star Children, new and old, in groups of 2-5 are in detention for something they did wrong & haven't been punished for.
🦊 Kuma Lisa explains detention lasts four hours, and people have to express regret for what they did by the end.
🦊 Time doesn't pass unless Star Children make progress toward that assignment.
🦊 It always takes four hours in Folkmore time.
🦊 Star Children who draw weapons from books during detention will be attacked on their way home.

To Prank or to be Pranked . ★

Content Warnings: Theft, Glitter Bombs, Minor Power Nerfing

There's a problem with the nonexistent mail delivery system in Folkmore. Gifts are being delivered to residents' addresses—their correct addresses, even if they live in the woods—but those recipients, written on a fat cream label, cannot pick them up, teleport them, or otherwise move them under their own power. These gifts sit in garish and contrasting colors that make certain to draw attention to themselves. Hello, here they are.

Anyone else can pick these packages up, from the person next door to a stranger walking by. There's so many gifts around it's easy to pick one up, remove the label, and go on one's way. Few people are home all the time, and even if they are, what are they going to do? Pick it up themselves? Ha! It's free ~~real estate~~. Star Children with abilities to see inside the packages can see something they want badly within as extra motivation to go for it.

When Star Children open their ill gotten gains, these packages explode in a glitter bomb that coats everyone within a ten foot radius. This glitter is impossible to wash out, magic away, or otherwise remove for twenty-four hours. Walk, swim, fly, or otherwise go about with glittery evidence of the crime committed.

Almost always. If it were guaranteed, where would the fun be in that?

The rare fortunate criminal or the original recipient, helped by another Star Child, will receive an item from home. This may even be a weapon or magical item. Those who receive an item will stop receiving gifts on their doorstep, whether they stole the gift or received it from a package addressed to them. They can keep stealing other people's gifts, but they will only receive a glitter bomb from then on.

Mischievous Star Children can even prank each other by changing the label and redelivering packages to someone else. Should that person get help to bring the gift inside, it still isn't their gift, not really, so it too will explode in glitter.

🦊 Gifts appear outside Star Children's residences, even those without residences.
🦊 Recipients cannot pick up the gift but any other Star Child can.
🦊 Almost all stolen gifts explode in a glitter bomb that leaves glitter for 24 hours.
🦊 Star Children can receive an item from home, even a weapon or magical item.
🦊 Star Children can prank each other by changing the labels/moving the packages.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Hunter is having SUCH a good time and would feel SO BAD if Casey transformed back just because Hunter is expressing some jealousy. It's much better this way.

Flapjack is still much more interested in snoozing than translating, so Hunter looks a bit bewildered? Encouragement, okay, and then -

Oh. Hunter goes rather pink and looks a bit uncertain. He's never had his horns touched by someone else, so he has no idea how that's going to feel. Good? Bad? ... Does it matter? He trusts Casey, so ...

After a moment of hesitation, Hunter nods and dips his head down towards Casey so that he can touch. The horns are basically like branches covered in a thin, almost silky kind of bark that swirls in patterns all the way to his skull. Funny, the colors at the tips are more of a (frankly unpleasant) green-black with an almost gooplike texture, while at the bottom the new growth seems to be coming in a much healthier looking teal gray with distinct wood grain to it. ]

Edited 2023-12-21 04:16 (UTC)

[Casey's never taken much opportunity to examine the horns in detail; he sees them every day, of course, and he'd navigated around them when he washed Hunter's hair that one time, but that was the closest he'd gotten and he was in no state at the time to notice little details. (Being halfway to passing out from exhaustion had not helped his observational skills.) Now, though, blessed with the sharpened eyesight of an owl(bear), he sees everything with such clarity.

He's not sure what to think of that... dark black goo on the tips, so he avoids those. He also knows he doesn't have the delicate control required to let his claws get anywhere near the soft looking bark. Unlike Rue, who has had hundreds, thousands of years to practice with their claws and learn sewing and cooking and craftwork, this is only the third or fourth time he's been an owlbear. So he keeps his claws resting lightly in Hunter's hair, instead using their leverage to get his head up just far enough to rub his face affectionately against the branches, the healthy section. His soft downy feathers can do no damage, and the swirling patterns of wood feel really nice to rub against. Something about these features just... feel good to be near. He's not sure how he'd begin to describe it if asked. He only knows he wants to protect and support Hunter even more than usual, now that he's up close.

He rubs against it a few more times, making soft, happy trilling noises. Like them. Like them a lot.]

[ No translation needed for that either. Hunter goes entirely red as Casey bunts up against him; he winds up leaning down a bit more so that Casey can get better access here.

It's nice. As it turns out, his horns are terribly sensitive, especially in the new growth that Casey is touching with his feathers. Claws could have been unpleasant, but this? Feels right.

As Casey trills his approval, a single, tiny white flower buds its way out of the fresh tree growth at the base of his horn. ]

[Casey doesn't notice at first, his face too close to the middle portion, just enjoying the sensation of the soft, silken wood. It's only when he pulls back (because as nice as it is, he can't be up there forever, that would be silly) that he catches sight of the bud. That... definitely wasn't there before. He leans in closer, sniffing at it, brushing it with his beak so delicately to make sure it's real, not daring to open his mouth lest he accidentally bite it or something. Sure enough, though, it's real... and it grew just now? Amazing...

He chirps excitedly, climbing back down to sit on his haunches in Hunter's lap, and gestures up towards the horn. New! New grow! A flower! Hunter look!

He said he was jealous and wanted cool magic, but what just happened is pretty cool magic to Casey...!]

[ That feels weird?? Not SENSITIVE exactly, but a distinct sensation from what he usually feels from his horns, which is relatively dull. And then there's Casey making excited noises, which he fully doesn't understand. ]

I - uh - sorry, I don't get what you're saying? Flapjack please.

[ The little cardinal opens one eye up? Considers Hunter for a moment, then burbles something. He says you grew a flower. ]

-- I grew a what??

[Casey beams, first at Flapjack - thanks! thanks you! - then at Hunter again. A flower, you grew a flower-

He ducks his head and pulls at Hunter's pocket, wherever he stores his relic. He's got a camera, he should see it for himself.]

What - hey, don't -

[ Hunter is laughing, though - gosh Casey is so wriggly like this - and he works his relic out of his pocket after a moment. Okay, he's got it. Now what? ]

Fine, let me see if I can get a look at it.

[ He carefully angles the relic to get a better look. Huh ... he does see something white in his hair? He squints at the viewfinder, trying to focus properly. ]

[He's wiggly both because he's excited, but also because it's nice to be so mobile like this. His pangolin form isn't nearly as agile.

But since Hunter gets the idea, Casey plops back and watches, eyes bright and eartufts lifted, waiting for him to react. It's good, right? A new flower? Things are changing, for the better. That's what he's thinking at least.]

[ Hunter finally manages to get the relic to focus enough to snap a picture. Then he pulls the relic down in front of him to look at himself. Sure enough, there's a lil white flower growing in his hair now. ]

That ... looks pretty nice. Yeah. I mean, I noticed my horns were looking less awful anyway.

[ That green-black stuff gives him the creeps for a lot of reasons. ]

This must be because of you.

[Casey considers that for barely a second or two before he shakes his head, lifting a paw to rest it gently against Hunter's chest where his heart would be. It wasn't him. He may have been the first, but Hunter is the one who's formed bonds with everyone else. Casey can't take credit for all the work he's put into his own growth.]

[ Hunter startles slightly at the gesture, but not in a bad way. It's a very nice little touch.

Funnily enough, Hunter understands Casey better in birb form when he DOESN'T use words. ]

Well - I - okay it's me too, but I wouldn't be here like this without you, Casey.

[Casey tilts his head, considering that, then nods. He taps Hunter's chest again, then his own, then gestures towards Flapjack, and finally to the window off to the side, trilling softly. Us!

He'll take credit, if all of them do. They're a family, and a real family - away from Belos - is surely what Hunter really needed to grow.]

[ Hunter puts the relic down and returns to petting Casey gently. ]

Yeah. This place is different from anything else I've ever had before. You and Rue and ... everyone.

[Casey hoots softly, tilting into the petting once more, nuzzling against Hunter's chest affectionately. He loves being an owlbear, it feels like he gets away with way more than he normally would.

It's true though, this world is very different. It's been amazing for both of them, and he's so grateful for that. All these new changes... it's exciting. What else could happen?]

[ This WOULD probably be way more awkward as a human, or at least something that would have Hunter blushing and nervous. But cuddling an owlbear? Totally normal.

Hunter winds up settling his head back against the couch as he continues to pet. ]

I hope we get to stay here forever. I ...

[ His hand pauses for a moment. A sudden, startling thing has occurred to him; he has to lower his voice to let the thought out into the open air. ]

I don't want to go home.

Edited 2023-12-21 13:52 (UTC)

[Casey pauses at that, tilting his head up and watching Hunter carefully for a long moment. This is a subject that has come up a handful of times before, not with Hunter but a few of the others in their family. He can't blame Hunter for not wanting to go back. There's so much that he's gained here, the idea of him having to lose it is heartbreaking.

It doesn't have to be here that he stays though. That's his current understanding of things. Casey chirps for attention, once again patting Hunter's chest, then his own. You, with me. Come back.

He'll probably have to change back and let them have a real conversation about this - it's important - but for now he wants to convey this much.]

What?

[ Sorry Casey, he's a little distracted. He winds up furrowing his brow and turning to Flapjack for this one. The lil birb burbles sleepily - He wants you to come home with him - before settling his head under his wing. No more translations, boys, use your own words.

Anyway, Hunter goes rather pink. ]

I - that's - really? You mean it?

[Casey hears that sleepy message from Flapjack and recognizes the implication beneath it. This isn't something that can be conveyed through chirps and interpretation.

He gives Hunter one last nuzzle, then climbs off his lap to sit at his side instead, shifting back into his human form. Only then does he nod in answer to Hunter's question.]

I mean it. It isn't just you, either. Leo wants to bring Peter. Rue said maybe they'd come with us, too. Everyone's going back to New York. I… I'd really like it if you came, too. If you wanted.

[Even if they weren't now a couple, he'd want that. He would miss Hunter terribly if they were separated, spirited off to different worlds and never to meet again. More than that, he doesn't want Hunter to have to go back to being alone in a dangerous world.]

[ And he would be terribly alone. No friends, burned bridges with his allies ... maybe this new Hunter would be able to make up ground? Or maybe he would simply be crushed by a world that doesn't want to acknowledge that he's changed.

(Can he abandon his world like that? He WAS the emperor ... but was he really doing any good? Can he do any more good now?) ]

I ... I'd like to. I'd really like to. It sounds ... nice.

[ He takes in a deep breath. If anyone can advise on this, maybe Casey can. ]

But what about mine? What if there's a chance to save it?

[That's a very fair question, and one Casey has to pause for to give it equally fair consideration. Most of them don't have that kind of stakes resting on their shoulders. His own world is dead, no way home and nothing to save. Peter can't go back, so he's free to join them. Rue has no responsibilities waiting for them. The turtles already saved New York. They're all free to choose. Hunter, less so. Or rather, he can still choose, but it might be a choice that comes down to his own needs versus that of the world's.

(And boy isn't that relevant to the conversation this whole thing started with.)

He frowns, leaning back and crossing his arms.]

Rue said there are portals to other worlds that exist… that Donnie was going to search for one on Earth that could let them visit the feywild, even if they came back to Earth with us. And the Boiling Isles are connected to Earth too, because how else could humans visit? So it's probably the same situation. If you come back with us, we can find a portal to your world, and we can save it together!

[ Hunter brightens a little at that. It's true that there MUST be portals - heck, he and Belos had been in the process of building one themselves - so couldn't there be a way? Go back to the human realm, gather up all of his new friends, and ...

And risk all of them against the same impossible fight he's currently hiding from. Risk them being maimed, possessed, killed, or worst.

Slowly, Hunter's shoulders droop again. And he shakes his head. ]

I couldn't live with myself if anything happened to you. Any of you.

[Casey furrows his brows, feeling a flare of complicated emotions he finds difficult to parse, and sits on that comment a few moments as he chooses how to reply. This will probably come up again. He can't blame Hunter; if their roles were reversed, he'd be hesitant to ask the other to come to his world and fight the Krang. Still, he's… kind of offended. It's fine to be protective, it's fine to worry. But-]

It's important to you. Isn't it? Even with how hard your life's been, or how dangerous it is… you love your world, don't you? You want to save it.

Of course I do!

[ It comes out all in a miserable burst. He does love his home, dang it, and he gave up so much just to TRY to keep it safe. Despite being alone, and feeling stuck in Belos's footsteps, and every other thing working against him. ]

But - but it's an apocalypse. Like yours. Everything's ruined, and even if we manage to stop the Collectors, it's still ruined. Maybe we can rebuild. It's not like we can -

[ He slows a bit, looking at Casey now. An idea is coming to him. Is it a good idea? Probably not. ]

Not like we can. Prevent it from ever happening...

[Casey goes still as Hunter trails off, seeing the beginning of an implication he's not ready for.]

Are- are you- you're thinking about time travel?

[His heart rate picks up, helplessly. No, no, no-]

It - it'd work, right? I could fix it. And I wouldn't have to risk anyone else, and no one would even have to know what almost happened!

[ He's babbling a little, nervous and excited and aware, deep down, that this would cost him everything. He'd be going back less than a year, and he'd have to directly deal with having a double of himself. There's no place in that fixed world for this Hunter. ]

How did you do it?

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