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JANUARY 2019 TEST DRIVE
JANUARY 2019 TEST DRIVE MEME
Welcome to January’s Test Drive Meme! This month's Test Drive's theme is: NEW YEAR'S.
All Test Drive Memes contain at least one clue to the Deerington's upcoming in-game events for the month! Keep your eyes peeled! But...not literally.
Characters may die during TDMs, but you do not need to count it towards a game-canonical death unless you want to. Consider it a freebie. All TDMs can be considered game canon as TDMs introduce minor aspects about the world of Deerington that can be revisited by characters later on in the game. You may also use TDMs for your application writing sample as well as AC.
CW: Mind alteration, alcohol, options for self-harm, knife violence.
Don't forget to tag content whenever necessary. Have fun!
YOU BETTER GET THIS PARTY STARTED
It's party night at the Grady Hotel and the hosts are pulling out all the stops. Champagne, funny hats, pictures, great music, and a wonderful countdown clock that let's everyone know just how much closer they're getting to the end of what has probably been a pretty crazy year for everyone. The glasses never seem to empty themselves and the citizens serving them out to people seem to be making extra sure that everyone has one for themselves. Regardless of whether or not you usually like champagne, anyone with a glass in their hands will eventually be tempted to take a sip, especially the closer it gets to midnight - the bubbles make you giggly, friendly, talkative in a way that you may never have been before. It lifts up just about anyone's spirits, no matter how rough of a time they've had before (or during their time in) Deerington. It doesn't seem to get you drunk, no matter how much you drink, but it definitely makes you more euphoric. Enough so that you might start to think you can do anything; tell someone how you really feel about them, compliment whoever you've had your eye on all night and see if they want to spend more time together, make up with someone you've been fighting with lately, do a magic trick you never were able to master, or even something as drastic as fly when you know you can't. Hopefully you start off trying to jump from a chair, but there is definitely roof access for those who are a little more daring - maybe someone a little more sober will have the wherewithal to stop you before it's too late.There is also plenty of entertainment happening in various parts of the room. A table with beer pong for the adults who never outgrew their college days, a dart board, card games in the back, and a game called Guess the Candy for those who want to test their sweet tooth. Anyone who wins a round of any game will get rewarded with a small gift from home (no bigger than a toaster). Unfortunately will disappear once you leave the party, so make sure to enjoy it while you can.
The dance floor is also lively, the music upbeat and easy to move to no matter what your personal tastes might be. If you want a random dancing partner, take a dance card! Each one has a random, glowing number on it and it's your goal to find the person who matches. Once you do, no matter who it is, you'll find yourself literally stuck together (hopefully just by your hands, but it can be any body part) and will have to go through an entire dance (or maybe even two) with them before you come unstuck.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Everyone starts to gather around the countdown clock as it nears midnight, and when it's down to ten seconds, obviously you've got to start counting too! Everyone seems to be having such a good time as they shout out each number (10! 9! 8!) and you might not even notice the way some of the people around you have started to get a little... twitchy? (7! 6! 5!) Or the way some are starting to get more handsy, pushing themselves up close to whomever is beside them. (4! 3! 2!) And it isn't until they all shout 1! in unison that the room seems to shift in two very different moods.If you're lucky, the person next to you will just have the urge to kiss you - and you might even have the urge to kiss them back! After all, sharing a kiss at midnight is supposed to bring you good luck for the rest of the year. And with the way everyone else is starting to act, you might need it. For some, the urge to kiss might be stronger than just a chaste peck. For those who find themselves wanting to get a little more intense, it might be best to try to sneak out the back and head back to your place. The moment you step outside into the cold air, though, the urges seem to disappear - unless, of course, you were in the mood all on your own.
If you're unlucky, there's a murderous rage that runs through you, and there seems to be a table of weapons near by to help encourage a messy time. Various knives, swords, machetes, and other blades are laid out, enough for almost everyone. You might find yourself driven to plunge your weapon into the closest person, or maybe someone you've hated for a long time, and even more - maybe someone you've loved. Whoever it is, the image of their face will be burned into your mind and you'll do everything you can to try and make them bleed. Hopefully they can fight for their life - or at least evade your attacks until they can trick you into going outside. Like the desire for love, the desire for murder will also disappear the moment that someone steps outside, regardless of whether or not they did so on purpose or just to try and hurt whoever they're after.
Character Arrival
You can read how all characters arrive in Deerington here.There is not a collective "all these characters showed up at the exact same moment" occurrence in Deerington. Since characters fall asleep, die, or pass out at various times throughout all their worlds, it wouldn't make too much sense if they arrived in game all at the exact same time. There should be some discrepancy between character arrival, whether by a couple minutes, hours, or even days up to a week.
The players are entirely in control of how/when they want to play their characters arriving in Deerington. For TDMs, you can play it like your character has just arrived and that can be maintained as your game canon, or you can wait until game events for that moment. Or you don't need to acknowledge it at all. The flexibility for character allows a bit more of an organic feel to the character arrival situation, so please play it to whatever feels right for you.
If you are interested in having an "arrival" introduction for one of your TDM prompts, you are more than welcome to explore that option.
no subject
I see. Perhaps you would be better off restored to the metaphysical.
[An esoteric, abstract, and perhaps more than a little pretentious way to say: I'm going to fucking kill you. They don't have a chance in hell, categorically speaking, but that's never stopped them before. They've been trying to be good, see. They've been trying, even though they know they're not.]
[And there's such a vicious relief in embracing that they've no choice in the matter.]
no subject
That's all just a circuitous way of saying that he thinks he can get in a relatively risk-free fight, have some fun doing it, and not have to feel guilty about it later. Worth a shot?]
You gonna be the one to do it?
no subject
[They smile. It's not as polished, not as refined, not as much a sort of armor as they'd like it to be - not yet.]
[But they smile.]
If that's your way of issuing a challenge?
I accept.
no subject
Oh - nnno. No, I don't think I should challenge you. If I do that, it's gonna sound really bad later when I tell people how I punched a seven-year-old in the face.
[.....]
Saying it out loud, it actually sounds bad now.
no subject
I see. You need me to make it easier for you.
[Perhaps punching a child is considered bad form. What about punching an attempted murderer?]
[Watch your legs, Michael; they might not have a great deal of reach, but they'd kind of like to know if your femoral artery bleeds the same way as the rest of you.]
no subject
[He dances back a little - far too carelessly for a human, not fast enough to entirely avoid the knife. But he doesn't have arteries, or a heart to make stuff spray out of him. A cut is about the same anywhere.
It does hurt. But you can't let the pain get to you too easily. He wasn't kidding about the parties, the kind they'd have around the office that started with ripping simulated animals apart and ended with each other. The sight of black soaking through the fabric of his dress pants is almost nostalgic in a funny way, and he doesn't think twice about reaching out to grab a fistful of their hair. No need to get fancy with someone so small, he's just gonna try to slam them into the wall.]
no subject
[Does not help them in the slightest when the sensation of fingers in their hair and the wrenching pull that wheels them into the wall is so familiar. Spools their heart up into their throat, soaking red into their thoughts. Human. Not human. Not.]
[Be good.]
[The child goes limp, allowing their body to ragdoll up against the surface with the mental shriek of bruising skin, flesh against wall.]
no subject
He's having fun. That's the thing: he's having fun. Everything he's been through, and he's still hurting people the second he gets the chance? He's supposed to be good now! Or trying, at least. They say the most important thing is that he's trying, except he stopped doing that a few minutes ago. He knew the whole time that it was wrong; he was just collecting justifications, like having enough little excuses piled up would make it right. Because...because what?
He's not supposed to want things like that anymore.
Michael lets go abruptly. There's still black oozing down his leg, enough now to reach the floor, and he nearly trips over himself as he backs away. He doesn't stop until he hits the opposite wall, and then he stares wide-eyed down at them. He hasn't taken their knife. They're probably not incapacitated. Distantly, he knows he should run if he's not going to take them down, but his body's all locked up, rigid and breathing too hard.
And, in a fucking bizarre turn, he thinks he has a stomachache.]
no subject
[Distantly, the child registers that they've ended up on the ground. That they've been let go. It doesn't make any sense.]
[They make another mistake. Namely, they look up.]
[They look up and aren't quite fast enough in veiling their expression of absolute desolation.]
[They drop their head once more with a shudder.]
Go ahead. [Speaking is - an effort. Speak anyway. Torque the tremor in their thoughts, the ache of memory in the back of their throat, into something tenuous. Into laughter, strangled and insincere.] Finish it. You - want to, right? Do I not deserve it?
no subject
[Michael bristles, and his voice is louder than he'd intended. They're not entirely wrong. Even if he's not having fun anymore, he's boiling with anger now, and it wants an outlet. He's used humans that way too, taking out his disappointment and boredom on the nearest body until he eventually got bored with that.
They look hurt, but then right away they're laughing as they call him out on every ugly impulse. It reminds him of Eleanor. There's been times he would've given anything to slam her head into a wall. She'd be so disappointed in him right now.
He continues in a lower tone:]
I am trying to be good, okay? I shouldn't have even done that to begin with. And now I'm doing that thing again where I yell at you because I'm really mad at myself! Boy, I am knocking it out of the park!
[Fuck, fuck. He breathes deliberately, and busies his hands with adjusting his cufflinks and his tie. By the time he's done that, they aren't shaking anymore. He's under control.]
[He hasn't fucked up this badly since he started caring, but he knows what he's supposed to do when he does. Apologize sincerely. He hasn't apologized to anyone who wasn't a friend before, but he does regret what he did. Maybe that's enough.]
I'm sorry I yelled, and I'm sorry I slammed you into the wall. You didn't deserve it, because it wasn't really self-defense. Do you need a doctor or something?
no subject
[Look at what you've done, now. You provoked this. You made this happen.]
I attacked first. I'm a threat. A danger to you, and everyone else.
[They try to keep the automatic comparison from cropping up - between this sharply dressed man who is and is not human, and the soft, reddish eyes of the Dreemurrs who knew that they had granted asylum to something incredibly powerful and incredibly dangerous, and yet did not hesitate for a moment before offering kindness and care.]
[It isn't fair.]
[It hurts to talk, but they shake their head anyway. Get up, slowly, pressed up against the wall for support. They've hurt worse. They've been hurt worse.]
[Their breath emerges in uneven, shallow spurts, their gaze chasing an exit that does not exist.]
Why aren't you doing anything about it?
no subject
[There's no boasting here; he's only stating a fact. Michael narrows his eyes as the kid gets to their feet. He still feels jagged and raw, and if distracting himself by lashing out is wrong, doing it by focusing on them doesn't seem so.
What's wrong with them? He knows all about how the human body can break, but there's never been a need for him to look at one and diagnose what's gone wrong. They don't seem concussed. Maybe they're just very winded?]
If you start looking threatening to anybody else, I'll do something about that then. Why are you so interested in stabbing to begin with? You're a human.
no subject
[It took no time, no effort on his part whatsoever, to coax the worst out of them. Always bubbling so very close to the surface. No matter how good you pretend you can be, you're really only ever pretending, aren't you? It's only ever a paper thin veneer over the real you.]
[Their head still hurts.]
[They laugh at that assertion - that they're human. Unfortunately. It's a cruel, unhappy sound.]
Don't remind me. Is that not answer enough?
[Humans, always predisposed to war and pain and looking for ways to impose that pain upon others. That is their nature.]
Since when is humanity capable of anything else?
no subject
[He actually does sound mildly offended on their behalf. Michael knows better than to put humanity up on some pedestal; he worked in Hell, he knows the kinds of things they can do. But he also knows that the vast majority of the ones he saw down there weren't actually evil. They were there for dumb, petty things.]
Anyway, we all have free will. I don't think humans are inherently good or evil, but if they were...
[They could try to be good despite it, and then relapse the second they're alone with a kid?]
...individuals could still choose to act differently.
no subject
[As far as comebacks go, it's not their personal best. But they've just been thrown into a wall and are having notable difficulties reorienting themself, despite the...hopeful lack of anything resembling a concussion.]
[They've felt worse. They're certain nothing's broken - if it were, they'd know. They'd know because they've fallen down a hole that no one was meant to survive falling down, and just about everything hurt.]
Humanity is as indelible as a cosmic stain, incapable of changing its nature.
no subject
[Michael lets out a short burst of laughter. Which is probably rude. But they're being rude too, so.]
You're serious? I'm a demon. We are literally a cosmic stain. Before humans came around, we used to get together and try to make stars collapse, because usually an angel would come along and be all offended about it, and then if you were lucky you could catch them in the black hole. You know that big one, out in Canes Venatici?
[...wait, no, they probably don't. Also that's not a great story in retrospect. Michael waves it off.
I'm not even lying, it's at the top of wikipedia's "supermassive black hole" list and I was like "oops that's coincidental"]Not important. Point is. You might have some shitty ape instincts bouncing around in there, but you're not inherently evil. Anyone who says otherwise is probably trying to avoid feeling responsible for whatever they did.
no subject
[Which they are, but that's not the point.]
You're a demon.
[That almost sounds like it's caught their interest. Congratulations.]
no subject
[Like, just FYI, don't @ him about Lucifer. Michael casually stoops down to scoop up some of that dripping black ooze with a finger, keeping half an eye out for sudden movements from Knife Kid as he does.]
And definitely not Dante's Inferno.
no subject
[Scorn comes easily. As does envy, of course. Not overtly; just enough to wish they could be something so innately depraved in at least a constructive sense, and not merely a vague, ephemeral, mildly destructive one.]
[In short, it'd be amazing to be an actual demon and not just an edgy child who wishes they could be one.]
no subject
It comes up a lot. I find the Dante thing particularly egregious - it's just some guy's list of everybody he hates, with a layer of Catholicism slapped on.
no subject
[This is familiar, easy, even. The cut and riposte of a sharp tongue in parallel with an adult's repeated assertions. Done in the wake of a bruised head and the aftershock of an altercation that they inevitably lost - it's even more so.]
[The literature is new. The demonic slant is also new, assuming it's true.]
no subject
I did ask you if you needed a doctor.
no subject
[It's as ruthless as it is bladed, a vicious edge that's not nearly so polished as it will be, one day, but deliberate nonetheless.]
Only if they're a euthanasiast.
no subject
Doubt it. I wouldn't rush to the afterlife, if I were you. Not a lot of opportunities for stabbing.
no subject
[They don't know exactly where kids like them should be burning, just yet. But they will. And will. And will, again.]
You really don't know what it is I want.
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