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

[She smiles a bit sheepishly - she's having kind of a bad run lately]

I try to avoid it.

A'ight, let me rephrase that --

[ He gestures with his free hand dramatically. ]

Piss off a lot of guys with guns?

[Chloe rolls her eyes dramatically]

It's literally not even my fault this time! Mostly. I was only stealing back stuff they took already.

This time?

[ He flashes an amused grin and shoves some vines out of the way. ]

Okay, yeah, that sounds perfectly justified to me. It ain't even stealing if they do it first.

Yeah, I mean... sometimes it's fun to piss those guys off a little. Builds character.

Yours or theirs?

[ Okay, he thinks this lady is actually alright. She's got the right idea of fun, at the very least. ]

Depends, I guess. Sometimes they learn a valuable lesson about being polite to women and sometimes they collapse a temple on you with a rocket launcher.

[ He's about to just cackle his way through when the end of that little story drops like an iron through a paper drum. He whistles. ]

Whoa. Talk about overkill.

It was so rude, honestly. Who would have done the stupid puzzles for him if he’d killed me? Can't imagine the toughs with guns were going to manage it.

[ Puzzles? Cliffs? Guys with guns? ]

Okay, okay, think I've got it. You work with Indiana fuckin' Jones.

[ He's joking. Mostly. She's definitely some kind of an adventurer and/or grave robber, though. ]

[Chloe laughs. It does feel that way sometimes]

No way. There's only room for one big ego on my team.

[ He raises an eyebrow, still amused. ]

So you're Indiana Jones. Great new look, by the way.

I look a lot better when I haven't just crawled out of the sea.

I'll take your word for it.

[ Finally, over the rustle of the leaves and chirps of jungle bugs, a welcoming sound can be heard; a faint trickle of running water. ]

[Chloe perks up immediately. You’d think she would have had enough of water, what with the whole falling in a river situation, but it's hot out here]

Hey, do you hear that? Even better than high ground.

[ It's hot, and humid, and a jungle brook is potentially more crisp than a muddy ol' river, assuming some animal hasn't died in it upstream. ]

Well shit, we're lucky.

[ Their chances of living another day have just increased, as far as he's concerned. He speeds up a little, and in a few more meters he nearly stumbles into a small but deep-looking pool, surrounded by lush vegetation on all sides and fed by a small waterfall running down a rocky structure stretching upwards. ]

[Chloe laughs, looking around like she's won the lottery]

Would you look at that. Everything we need.

Don't suppose you have anything on you to actually carry water in?

[ He catches himself on some tree which leans over the water with a bit of a swear, and immediately looks around. The shore is pretty steep where they came from, but he can see a more reasonable access to the water on the right, so he carefully retreats back into the path and heads that way. ]

...no.

[ His enthusiasm fades somewhat as he realizes that pretty much means they're trapped here. ]

Can we make something like that?

[ She's apparently a former Girl Scout or something. Maybe she's got that covered, too. ]

[Chloe shrugs, following his new path down to the shore. On her own she might have just jumped, but that does make conversation more difficult]

Dunno. I usually pack in my own water, but my canteen’s in the jeep.

[ Squalo glances back with a raised eyebrow. ]

Let me guess, you forgot where you parked it?

[ Sarcasm. Sort of. He definitely hasn't seen any vehicles so far, but what the fuck does he know. Maybe there's a mall right behind that next hill. ]

[Chloe huffs in pretend indignation]

I know where I parked it! I just don't know where I am in relation to that anymore.

Not to doubt you, but this place isn't givin' me much civilisation vibes.

[ He finally makes it down to the water, peering at it curiously before he motions at it while turning back to Chloe; ]

Ladies first?

[ He just wants to find out if it's not poisoned or something. :) ]

That's the point! What kind of treasure are you going to find in New York?

[Fortunately for him she really is thirsty. Possibly unfortunately for him she is really annoying. She confidently drinks a couple of handfuls of water and moments later starts coughing dramatically]

That ain't what I meant, it doesn't look like the kinda place you just drive up to--

[ MOTHERFU-- ]

[ He had been waiting and not drinking himself yet, but he does kind of balk when she just starts hacking and coughing. ]

What the fuck?!

[Chloe keeps that up for a few more seconds, then dissolves into laughter]

It's fine.

[She snorts, still laughing ]

Your face...

(no subject)

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wrap?

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