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

Conan Edogawa | Detective Conan

[just_add_aptx]

arrival
[He wakes up covered with sand and salt water, completely disoriented. Before anything else, he grabs his glasses out of the sand, shoves the slightly oversized black plastic frames on his face with his small hands.

Those in place, he looks around. Warm water, seabirds, high angle of the sun, tropical plants in the forest stretching back from the sandy beach, all indications of somewhere far more equatorial than Japan. It's a quick, appraising glance, as he takes in his surroundings, with a focus that's very much at odds with his appearance. A kid as little as Conan is should probably be freaking out right now. (He is, actually, but he's a detective through and through and so his freaking out is currently manifesting as urgent investigation).]

Careful. [Says the small-for-his-age seven year old, as he crouches down to look for footprints in the sand. ] Don't move around too much. Do you know what's going on?

network
[Edogawa Conan, callsign DC770K is absolutely going to use the text function on this thing. Judging from the voices he's heard, he's apparently the youngest person here by far, and he doesn't want to deal with any overprotective adults when he's just trying to get his bearings.]

Has anyone found anything of interest yet? Or started making a map of our surroundings? I'd also like to know if anyone has any memories of how we actually arrived here.

exploration
[There is a very small child (like, maybe five or six years old? he's tiny) trying to climb a tree. He's doing a pretty good job, all things considered, though he's currently stuck on a branch about six feet off the ground, a determined frown on his face and one hand braced against the trunk as he stands on tiptoes trying to grab the next branch, just out of reach.]

exploration

[trialbyliar]

[Kokichi is also teeny. Not five year old teeny, of course, but he can sympathize with the struggle. And maaaybe, childish as he is himself, he has a soft spot for kids.

Not that he'd ever admit to it. He's supposed to be the bad guy, after all.

It also raises some more questions about what the fuck is going on here that there's even such a small child, but he can grapple with those later. For now, he does the only rational thing, which is hop up to grab the lowest end of the kid's branch and dangle himself off the ground. Possibly not the safest move with a small child actively standing on it, but he's rational, not responsible.]

Aww, having trouble there, pipsqueak?

[ kokichi shut up you barely clear 5' ]

[just_add_aptx]

[Conan has to scramble a little bit, grabbing the trunk of the tree as the branch shakes under him. He shoots a look at the other boy, an exasperated expression like he's very used to this kind of treatment. (Life is rough when you're short, doubly rough when you're a short first grader).]

I'm trying to get somewhere where I can see.

[trialbyliar]

[It's kind of a hilarious look on such a small child. Precocious kid. Kokichi grins up at him, snickering, and then kicks a leg up over the branch to swing himself up.]

See what, the ground rushing up to meet you right before you break your neck?

[He may be short, but he's still got like two feet on this kid, so he leans over said kid and grabs the next branch with ease, pulling himself up.

The responsible adult thing to do would probably be shooing the kid back to the ground where he won't break his neck, maybe try to soothe him with a promise to take a look around instead. But Kokichi isn't an adult and he has a very firm policy about acting his age, so he hooks a foot around the brach to secure himself and leans down to offer a hand.]

C'mon, upsy-daisy.

[just_add_aptx]

[Conan accepts the help, scrambling up to the next branch with the skill of a little kid who spends a fair amount of time scrambling around in weird places.]

I'm trying to get above the tree line so I can get a better view of the area. [He explains, looking around to find the next branch to grab.]

Have you seen anything interesting yet?

network: L0N13Y

[lonelynotforsaken]

[The message comes back in voice because that's too much to type on this sort of device.]

I haven't actually found any paper or anything, yet. I'm trying to keep a mental map? Oh! And I've been marking some of the bigger trees I've passed by with a knife I've got. It's sort of the best I can manage right now. Have you found supplies?

[just_add_aptx]

Have you seen anything interesting yet? There aren't any significant landmarks visible from where I am.

[lonelynotforsaken]

[Well, okay, person. Martin frowns at the text that comes in response to his voice message. Whatever.]

Um... There was a tree with a sort of weird branch that was all wiggly?

[just_add_aptx]

[Yeah, that's not what he meant by a landmark.]

Anything anybody else would be able to find?

[lonelynotforsaken]

Not... really. I could build something, maybe? Oh! Like- I could use branches from the trees and make a giant arrow on the beach.

[just_add_aptx]

Or maybe a giant SOS? I saw that in a movie once.

[lonelynotforsaken]

That's a really good idea! Maybe all of us should do that. If there are lots of spots on the island with those, then more chances for a plane or ship to spot us. Although, if we're trying to find each other or use them for-for landmarks, should we differentiate them at all? I could add my initials?

[just_add_aptx]

That's a really good idea! I'm going to make one out of rocks to make mine different!

[lonelynotforsaken]

Okay! Yeah... that's a good idea. And... I'll still do, like, an arrow pointing in the direction I went. And mark the trees. I can do SOS signs every so often. We'll have this whole place covered in SOSes in a few days!

[How big could this place be?]

Arrival

[droppinnoeaves]

Sam is not so quick to come to his senses, sitting up in the sand without regard for his sopping clothes. He has to wrest his stare from the horizon to look at the- the child. That’s a child. They’re about the same height, but Sam’s seen human children before. Immediately, he pushes himself to his feet, looking about them both.

“No, I don’t. Lad, where are your kin?”