TDM #1

[glencolans]

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

Comments

exploring

[3_strikes]

[ For all that Three is doing its best to avoid further encounters with humans while exploring its surroundings, it has somehow still managed to run into this... very strange teenager in the jungle. The misunderstanding had been simple—Three had seen the flicker of blue flames through the trees and had thought it warranted investigation. It had not expected those flames to come from someone's head.

Judging by the distinct lack of burning flesh and screaming, it is a holographic cosmetic effect.

More importantly: Three is now faced with this sharp-toothed, mud-smeared teenager who is currently advising the SecUnit on protection from parasites. At least its apprehension at encountering an unfamiliar human is somewhat mediated by its bewilderment regarding said human's appearance. ]

Thank you for that information, [ it says stiffly. ] However, I do not require protection from insects.

[ It probably should not explain why. If Three doesn't trust itself to actively pretend to be human, it can at least avoid acknowledging the fact that it's a rogue SecUnit. It pauses, and then: ]

They don't find me palatable.

[ It's not a lie. ]

[littleshroud]

No?

[Ortho stands as he finishes pulling his arms free of the blazer, leaving him in a long-sleeved button-down. He plops it over the top of his head, tying the arms underneath his chin.]

How interesting! I've never heard of mosquitos being picky--are you, perhaps, a lifeform separate from human?

[He doesn't look like a beastman, and he's pretty sure beastmen suffer from insect bites just as readily. Fae, perhaps...?]

[3_strikes]

[ The question gets a long, slightly panicked stare. The teenager doesn't seem too alarmed by his suggestion that Three might not be human, so maybe it is a joke? Certainly, he does not behave like a human encountering what he suspects might be a rogue SecUnit. ]

I am an augmented human.

[ Three fights to keep its expression under control as it says the words. It knows it is a bad idea to try to pass itself off as human—almost as bad an idea as admitting what it actually is. ]

I'm just. Lucky.

[ So mosquitos don't bite it. Is that a joke? It hopes so. Though, the fact that it says it completely unsmiling and tense does not particularly help with its presentation. ]

[littleshroud]

Augmented?

[Those bright yellow eyes of his perk up considerably, his sharp-toothed smile going from friendly to full-on excited.]

In what way? Have you been fixed with cybernetics? Oh, no--is maintenance going to be a problem for you, in this environment? [Ortho pauses, abruptly looking somewhat bashful.] Sorry, that kind of thing is rude to ask and make assumptions about all of a sudden, huh? I'm an engineer, so the subject gets me pretty excited...

[3_strikes]

[ Three only grows more tense as the teen keeps talking. Out of all the humans it could have told that lie to, it had told it to a young engineer with an interest in cybernetics. Even without its risk assessment module, it can sense that it’s chances of maintaining the deception have just dropped sharply. ]

Thank you for your concern, [ Three says stiffly. ] My cybernetics can withstand a variety of adverse environmental conditions, including heat and humidity. Additionally, most of my modules were already rendered offline when I woke up here.

[ It realizes that it is doing a very suboptimal job of appearing human. If it wishes to have any chance of deceiving anyone, it will need to make an effort to follow human rules of social expression and divert from topics most likely to expose the truth.

At least the protocol for first meetings it basic enough. ]

What is your name?