TEST DRIVE MEME #1

Welcome to Glencola Reef's first Test Drive Meme! This is a place where anyone interested in applying a character - or just curious to see how their characters might interact with the setting and others in the game - can mingle with one another. General prompts are provided below for inspiration.

TDM GUIDELINES

Please read the rules before posting to the TDM. These still apply here and will be enforced, up to and including deleting tags/toplevels and prebanning.
Posts from a TDM are required to apply. At least three tags across any number of threads within a TDM, posted within the last 6 months, must be provided in every application.
TDM threads can be used for AC. Note that new characters only need to check in for their first AC cycle, but established characters can use TDM tags for their AC.
TDMs are not considered game canon by default. This is mostly for logistics reasons - due to how characters travel on the map, it's unlikely that non-network threads that take place here will actually happen in-game. However, I won't stop anyone from working out how to make parts of threads game canon if they really want to.
New TDMs will be posted every three months. Keep checking back into the current TDM for new toplevels!

I. ARRIVAL

You awaken on a tropical island beach, soaking wet, powerless, and without any idea how you got here. Were you carrying something important, or wearing powerful armor? How unfortunate - it looks like only the most basic clothes, items in your pockets, and simple weapons managed to make the trip with you. Are you even physically the same as you remember? If you had superhuman abilities tied to your physiology, you might be stuck in a completely different body that lacks your usual senses. You might've been whisked away from a tense battle or a near-death experience and wake up delirious, or even injured.

Thankfully, against overwhelming odds, you're not the only one to wake up on this particular stretch of beach. You and your companion have a lot of puzzling out to do.

II. NETWORK

Even if you weren't lucky enough to wake up near someone else, at least you've arrived with a military-grade radio transceiver gripped tightly in your hand (or mouth, or other vaguely opposable appendage of choice). The clunky walkie-talkie will start buzzing and crackling for every public message that starts coming your way. Answering them back is as easy as pressing the "talk" button on the side of the device and either speaking into the receiver, or using the keypad to type into the message box that appears on the screen, then pressing the button again to send. A list of ongoing conversations with responses that are less than 24 hours old can be found by scrolling through the menu, identified by the callsigns that are participating in them. It seems that you've been assigned a callsign, too - it shows up in the top right side of the screen, format AB123C. The letters and numbers picked are...probably random.

This is your easiest avenue to communicating, or coordinating with, or complaining at the other people stuck on this island; how you decide to use this tool is up to you.

III. EXPLORING

For a place that appears, by all signs, to be an equatorial island in the middle of a tropical ocean, the local environments are surprisingly diverse. Beaches range from idyllic white sand to storm-swept pebble crags to cliffs with waterfalls cascading off the edges; the interior forests can be thinned from sandy soil or dense jungles full of prickly underbrush and with towering canopies; and the central mountain peaks, perilous enough to climb on their own, terminate in ravines and sinkholes that are hidden by thick foliage until you already have one foot over the edge.

The animals that make their homes here are equally as varied, and sometimes just as dangerous. The standard Earth fare of tropical fish swim right up to most shores, especially where reefs have grown, and a multitude of seafaring and jungle birds make their homes in ocean-facing cliffs and trees. Any one of these creatures would make for an easy snack. But you're not the only opportunistic hunters here; sharks prowl the waters, big cats stalk the jungles, and feral boars raid any camps that smell enticing. And that's just the stuff that looks like it came from modern Earth. Your improvised fishing rod might have captured a trilobite, or maybe that deer you were stalking has rounded on you with a set of alien mandibles full of sharp teeth. Or maybe, among the plants and animals completely foreign to you, you've stumbled across one that's strangely familiar to your home and no one else's.

There's a lot to figure out about this place. At least, in this instance, you aren't doing it alone.

NAVIGATION

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Exploring

What? You've never seen a seventeen year old kid, in a soaking wet suit and tie, fight a wild boar with a rapier before? Isn't this how everyone went about getting their bacon in the morning?

Alright, maybe not and in all honesty Lockwood hadn't gone out looking to pick a fight with the local wildlife. He wasn't a hundred percent and he wasn't really that hungry yet, but he and the boar had crossed paths and the boar had decided to make an issue of the situation. Lockwood had considered running but he knew that unless the creature gave up the chase, eventually he'd have to climb something and he wasn't physically up to climbing trees.

That left stand and fight. Good news being that Lockwood was used to fighting in close quarters, so even though they were in the tangled underbrush of the boar's territory, the youth had gotten in a couple good strikes. The fight looked to be closer to finished than started, and if anyone around knows how to dress wild board, their skills may be needed shortly.

Network

"Hello, is anyone listening?" Over the device it is hard to tell Lockwood's age. His voice is deep, posh and booms with a calm confidence well beyond his years. He sounds friendly, warm and inviting.

"I've happened upon some fresh boar meat." 'Happened upon.' "I was wondering if anyone else was hungry and would like some? Quite a bit more here than I'll be able to eat and it feels wrong to let the animal go to waste. Afraid I don't have any tea to offer you to go with it." He really is just too British at times.

"Oh and if anyone might happen to have arrived with a first aid kit on them and would be willing to share? I'd be quite in your debt."

Well if this isn't highly fucking suspicious. Seems like two kinds of bait, to Rust. And yet: "You injured?" Crackling over the walkie, his voice sounds stereotypically American—which is to say, it has a Texas twang—and raspy.

Lockwood isn't nearly as paranoid as the individual on the other end of the walkie-talkie, though of course he has no way of knowing that, but he is savvy enough not to scream crippling vulnerability across the network.

"Not so you'd notice," especially if he hid it. "But after a lively battle with my dinner it got me thinking that having some medical supplies around here might be beneficial."

"Not so I'd notice," the voice repeats, irritated to the point of incredulity. The walkie clicks off.

...and then, call it five minutes later, he's back. "I know the basics, but if we've gotta play twenty questions over whether you've got a snake bite or a fucking concussion, might be better served letting nature run its course."

He sounds winded, by the end of that. The walkie catches a few harsh breaths between words.

"Goodness, you sound like a cheery fellow," the posh voice is at once amused and also edged in equal measures. "Is that how all of us on this island plan to survive? By sniping at one another?"

It would be like living on an island of Kippses.

"I am neither snake bit or concussed and if you are hurrying on my account there is no need. If, however, you are running from one of the many things on this island trying to kill us, I would be happy to come help?"

Help the voice on the phone or the thing possibly trying to kill him? Probably the former. Most likely the former.

"The fuck you talking about?" Now that he knows—thinks he knows—the kind of man he's dealing with, Rust's voice goes flat and even. He's not running anywhere, but the question's all-encompassing.

"Listen. Time's a limited resource, especially in the jungle. It'll run out on you before you know it. So maybe"—one sharp breath—"stop fucking around." Almost reluctantly: "And if you're cut you better hope to hell it doesn't get infected."

Over and out. (Unless...)

Randvi had been hoping to avoid the wild boar running about noisily nearby - yes, she’s hungry but the short reach of her war hammer doesn't exactly make boars the ideal opponent - but then she hears a human voice as well.

The owner of the voice could know what’s going on, and if the boar is causing him problems, it might be all the better. It has never hurt to have people who know more than you owe you something.

She emerges into a more open area and is surprised to see a very young man wielding a bizarre sword. He looks a bit winded, but the boar is worse for wear as well.

She raises her voice. “Do you need help?”

[He's been using text over the network, as much as a pain as it is to type it out on the clunky buttons of the radio.]

Already dead or are you armed?

This is truly incredible, Lalo thinks. The attempt to lure out the desperate or naïve is so painfully transparent that he can't help but be a little impressed and in awe of the sheer audacity.

Nevertheless, he responds. His voice is warm, confident, and surprisingly cheery, considering the situation. The voice also speaks with a faint Mexican accent; very faint, in fact, almost disappearing at times. But it's there if you listen.

"You... 'happened upon' it?" Some skepticism. "Shit, man. Dunno if I'd eat meat that's been sitting out like that. Isn't that supposed to be, I dunno, not safe?"

TDM #1

TEST DRIVE MEME #1

TDM GUIDELINES

I. ARRIVAL

II. NETWORK

III. EXPLORING

Anthony Lockwood | Lockwood and Co

network | callsign XZ419F

network | callsign Lockwood

no subject

no subject

no subject

Exploring

network | callsign: DC770K

network | callsign: DI481O