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

[lonelynotforsaken]

It's a weird thing to say, but Martin thinks he... gets it. What he gets less is the man pressing on the point about Jon. Martin can hear that he's stopped walking, and pauses, himself, hand gripping the walkie-talkie tightening for a moment. "Yeah, well, you can doubt all you want. I know he's alive." The alternative... is a world where Martin does not want to be alive or existing. "He's survived worse than being stabbed.

"Are you coming or not? I can look for him by myself if you'd rather head inland."

[silberfuchs]

Albert frowns. Denial is a hell of a thing, but he understands. No one wants to believe someone they care for has died, especially in a violent or traumatic manner. Martin will have to face that truth in time, Albert just hopes it doesn't get in the way of his survival.

Which... he could probably do something about, honestly. Even if his cybernetics aren't all functioning properly, he's still probably a lot hardier than a nearsighted civilian. If he's a civilian. Being stabbed is uncommon enough for your average person, encountering worse is suspicious.

"I am. It makes sense to follow the trees for a time, see if there's a river we can follow in." Fresh water will be important if they're left to their own devices for too long. "I apologize if I offended you. We should work together if we're going to find out who brought us here and why."

[lonelynotforsaken]

"It's fine." His tone is prickly, and Martin knows he needs to not. He purses his lips. "We definitely need to work together. Yeah." He doesn't want to work with someone who isn't Jon right now, but that's not practical. "If you see a backpack, it might be mine. There should be some useful things for us in there."

[silberfuchs]

"I will keep an eye out. I didn't have anything useful on me that would have been transported with me, unfortunately." Except his sunglasses, but those wouldn't be globally useful right now, just personally.

He's quiet for a moment as they walk, mulling over their predicament, the radios, and the lack of knowing how they arrived and considers the likelihood of this being some part of the whole His Voice fiasco that hadn't been resolved or some other issue. Underground experiment perhaps? It feels a lot more like some kind of experiment. In fact, it feels a lot like when Black Ghost used to run drills on his and his family's cybernetics, only his systems are all not working as they should... But if it is some kind of experiment, then what does that make Martin? Randomly kidnapped control group? Who did he piss off? The list Albert has for himself and the other zero zero series cyborgs is too long to name, but if Martin shares a name on that list then maybe they can narrow it down some.

"Can I ask... Do you know of anyone you'd made an enemy of?"

[lonelynotforsaken]

Martin knows he needs to do a little more investigation into this stranger, figure out more about him. But after his misstep with the eyes, he feels awkward. The desire not to be around strangers when he doesn't know if Jon is alive--when he doesn't know if he actually murdered the most important person in his life--is also coming on particularly strong.

He's lost in his own thoughts, scanning the shoreline for a familiar form, until Albert asks a rather annoying question. Not an unreasonable one, but the specific phrasing is inconvenient. Martin knows he could outright lie, but he does try to avoid that. Easier to keep track of what you've said when it's half-truths rather than outright falsehoods.

"Um..." He glances up, thinking... about how to phrase this, but he'll let the other man assume whatever he wants about that. "W-well, I got... I reported some illegal things by boss was doing, and it got him arrested. I'm an administrative assistant for an academic institution. Or I-I was. I was sort of... Jon and I had quit and were taking a holiday for ourselves." There's so much context missing from that, it's painful, but he thinks he's covered his bases. Admin should lend itself to the assumption of white collar crimes rather than murder that would need to be explained in more detail.

[silberfuchs]

Assuming Martin is telling the truth, there are a couple academic institutions that he knows are fronts for more nefarious dealings, though most of those are in the United States or Japan and fairly toothless now as far as the Gilmore Foundation is able to tell, so it really could just be an isolated incident of embezzlement or other innocuous everyday crime that doesn't involve paramilitary organizations or weird science.

If Martin is telling the truth. He keeps avoiding eye contact. That in and of itself could mean anything, but considering this all sprouted from someone having gotten stabbed... well, he has suspicions.

"What institution? Or did you simply get mugged on holiday?" He keeps an eye on Martin's reaction, knowing full well he's feeding the man a cover story. If he takes it, then that says something too.

[lonelynotforsaken]

Moment of truth or lies. He doesn't think most people will have heard of it outside of other avatars, so... "The Magnus Institute. It's, um... W-we study... supernatural phenomenon. I know that sounds silly, but, like... Our research department's had some stuff published! Not just in- Like in reputable publications. About folklore and mythology. That sort of thing?"

He looks down at his shirt. "But... it wasn't really a mugging. We got into a really bad situation, but we put ourselves there." Martin frowns. "That's why I need to find him. I need to make sure he's okay. O-or help him if he isn't."

[silberfuchs]

"I don't think it sounds silly. 'There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.'" Shakespeare, but it's the best and most poetic way he can think of to express that he's not a complete skeptic without explaining that he's met aliens and ghosts, traveled through time, and been to an ancient city of lizard people deep beneath the crust of the earth, among other things.

Martin not immediately agreeing with his story is a point against the lying theory, but he's not really sure where that leaves them. Other than stranded together on an island. "Well, if this is an island and he was transported with you, we're bound to find him sooner or later."

Find his body, anyway.

[lonelynotforsaken]

The use of Shakespeare gets a surprised raise of Martin's brows. Also the fact the man isn't immediately dismissing things. "R-right."

He's quiet as they walk for a little longer before he can't entirely help his curiosity. "So... you like Shakespeare? That's neat."

[silberfuchs]

"I do. I like his history plays best, and the sonnets." Though The Tempest comes to mind currently for the strangers in a strange land aspect being so close to home. Or far from home, rather. "I tend to prefer Goethe and Schiller - especially for the symphonies based on their works - but any words that reach to the heart of the human condition are art in their own right, to my mind, and Shakespeare's contributions, while they can and have been consistently overstated, are well regarded for a reason."

He lets the quiet fall between them for a long moment, accompanied only by the sound of their steps on the sand and low brush at the tree line they've finally reached, before regarding Martin curiously. "Do you like Shakespeare?"

[lonelynotforsaken]

He talks and he analyzes and- Oh, god, he's a proper intellectual. And he's built like a tank. Brawn and brains really isn't fair. "Uh... y-yeah. Yeah! I think, um... A Midsummer Night's Dream is my favorite. I-I-I like m-more light-hearted stuff."

Oh, god, he needs to throw in some sensible-sounding commentary. "I mean the tragedies are great, too! Who doesn't love Hamlet? Or King Lear?" Say something smart. Come on. "His father made gloves for a living, you know?" Martin winces at himself. It's the only thing his mind seems to be able to pull from the one school visit he'd done to the Globe when they'd moved down to London. "Which... was important to his work what with a lot of people wearing... gloves in his plays?"

[silberfuchs]

Albert quirks an eyebrow at this information. The conclusion about gloves in the plays is idiotic, but he'd never really studied Shakespeare the man so much as his works, rendering the information about his father as news. "I didn't know that. Interesting."

Might as well throw the poor man a bone.

"I have a good friend who's an actor. He prefers tragedies, but mostly so he can play a good death scene. He'd go around the house expounding 'Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow' from Macb-" GB's haranguing comes readily to mind and Albert corrects himself, grinning ruefully. "From the Scottish play. He's quite good, but a better Bottom I think."

GB would have such mixed feelings about Albert's opinion of his performances. He lives for drama but he's very talented at comedy, which is high praise from Albert who isn't the most mirthful of people unless you enjoy your humor black and dry as a desert. "I get the feeling you have other writers you're more fond of, though?"

[lonelynotforsaken]

"L-loads!" Loads and loads of writers. Who are not Shakespeare. Martin has read books. He knows names. The fact that every single one of them seems to have fled from his mind in this moment is immaterial. They exist.

There's a drawn out silence.

"Maybe we should-we should look in the jungle just a little. I don't think Jon would have gone far from the beach, but just... for wat- Keats! I like Keats!" There! A single author!

[silberfuchs]

"Uh-huh." Albert looks aside again at Martin, nonplused. "You don't have to try and impress me, you know. It's fine if you don't really read much, not everyone does."

Because that has to be what this is, right? It's too fumbling to be anything but.

"When we find a river we'll head upstream. There has to be at least one to support all of this plant growth. That or we're going to get caught in a torrential downpour at any moment."

[lonelynotforsaken]

"I do! I-I read lots of things." He does! This is just a lot, okay? And he's discombobulated. And Albert is intense and smart and big and strong and- It's a lot. "All kinds of things. It was really intense when I just came from!" His voice has jumped up half a strained octave, and he clutches his radio tight enough it's turning his knuckles white.

"But... fine. We can- yeah. Let's do... that."