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5.0 Test Drive Meme
5.0 Test Drive Meme
Premise & Arrival ֍ FAQ ֍ Apply ֍ Navigation
Welcome to Well! See the first prompt for how your characters arrive in Well. Your character arrives with only a handful of memories, clad in a mix of Old Western clothes and clothes that might fit in at a renaissance fair, and no items from home.
Anyone is free to play on the TDM, but you need an invite to apply. Feel free to use these prompts, and interact with the arrival or locations. NPCs are around, but only say a certain set of phrases. TDMs can be considered game canon.
This TDM takes place from the first week of February onward, and can happen concurrently with other events during February and March. This will be the only TDM for February, March, and April.
Applications are open January 27th until February 1st, and February 24th until March 1st. Invites are available for friends of current players.
Arrival: Six Feet Under
Content warnings: graves, being buried alive
You wake up in the ground. The hole you're in fits your body nicely. Just as you wake up, dirt spatters onto your face, into your eyes and mouth. Maybe that's what woke you up. Before you've had a chance to clear it, more dirt drops onto your body from above, again and again, in a grim rhythm. Until you get out of there it won't stop.
Unfortunately, you're six feet deep. You might want a hand.
More unfortunately, you won't get one from the person with the shovel. The gravedigger, silhouetted in black against the sky above you, will continue to shovel dirt onto you while you try to escape. Once you're out, she loses all interest and moves on to the next grave. She doesn't acknowledge you in any way.
Above the grave is a headstone: your own. It says your name and it might have your birthdate. The death date is unreadable. There may be an epitaph about your life. It doesn't look new. In fact, it looks as old and worn as the rest of the graveyard. Other open graves are scattered around in this graveyard, and other people are climbing up out of them, too. Maybe you want to lend them a hand, or maybe you want to get out of here as fast as possible.
A mossy wrought-iron gate leads out into greenery.
Now that you're out, you need to find your way... somewhere. Not here.
For current players, you're welcome to have your character wake up for the cycle like this.
tl;dr:
You wake up in the ground. The hole you're in fits your body nicely. Just as you wake up, dirt spatters onto your face, into your eyes and mouth. Maybe that's what woke you up. Before you've had a chance to clear it, more dirt drops onto your body from above, again and again, in a grim rhythm. Until you get out of there it won't stop.
Unfortunately, you're six feet deep. You might want a hand.
More unfortunately, you won't get one from the person with the shovel. The gravedigger, silhouetted in black against the sky above you, will continue to shovel dirt onto you while you try to escape. Once you're out, she loses all interest and moves on to the next grave. She doesn't acknowledge you in any way.
Above the grave is a headstone: your own. It says your name and it might have your birthdate. The death date is unreadable. There may be an epitaph about your life. It doesn't look new. In fact, it looks as old and worn as the rest of the graveyard. Other open graves are scattered around in this graveyard, and other people are climbing up out of them, too. Maybe you want to lend them a hand, or maybe you want to get out of here as fast as possible.
A mossy wrought-iron gate leads out into greenery.
Now that you're out, you need to find your way... somewhere. Not here.
For current players, you're welcome to have your character wake up for the cycle like this.
tl;dr:
- You wake up in your own grave! Someone's burying you alive! Better get out of there.
The only way out
Content warnings: being eaten alive, carnivorous flowers, intoxication
The graveyard is in the middle of the maze: a sprawling hedge maze on the outskirts of Wellstone town. The ground is soft with recent rain, and the hedges are just blooming green like it's early spring. Your shoes squelch in the muck.
It starts easily enough. As you make your way deeper, though, you'll start run into things that make the maze… harder. Gigantic flowers block the way down one path, and they titter together as you get close, swaying and moving in ways that flowers shouldn't. If you do get too close, a flower lurches forward and snaps its petals around you like jaws. Are those teeth?! They're like foot-long cactus spines, sharp and deadly. You might want to get out of there, and fast. The teeth hurt, and the inside of the flower isn't a cakewalk either. It hurts your skin, and if you're in there too long, your skin may start to burn off.
Down another path are more flowers. These are smaller, and oddly fleshy in color and scent. At the center of each flower is an eye. Some of them seem familiar, although you can't figure out why. As you pass, the eyes roll, following you closely. If you make eye contact and any of these flowers, you feel a chilling wave of fear that roots you to the spot. Your stuck in its gaze, staring back at it as it stares impassively at you. You have the horrible feeling that if you stay here, something awful will happen. It grows worse and worse, more acute, but no matter how strong that fear, you can't move your feet. Someone, or something, has to break your eye contact with the flower.
At a final turn in the maze, the sweet, soft scent of lilacs fills the air. You're sure that scent means you've found the end, and that you should follow it. Naturally, it doesn't. It leads to a dead end. Again. This one, at least, is beautiful: it's a little meadow surrounded by hedges, blooming in lilacs and lavender and little purple-headed poppies. The scent is heady and overwhelming. It fills you up. It settles into your head like a haze, making it hard to focus. It seems like an amazing idea to just… stay here. Lie down, maybe, among all those nice flowers. Just for a little while, you tell yourself.
Only, it may be more than a little while. The longer you sleep in this lovely little meadow, the more vines and flowers will grow over and around your body. Eventually, they'll make their way into your nose, your ears, your mouth and start to pull you down into the soft earth. Someone's going to have to wake you up and get those vines off unless you want to stay in this maze forever!
When at last you find your way out of the maze, past the treacherous flowers, you set your sights on Wellstone: a town in the first bloom of spring, a light mist making everything dewy and bright.
tl;dr:
The graveyard is in the middle of the maze: a sprawling hedge maze on the outskirts of Wellstone town. The ground is soft with recent rain, and the hedges are just blooming green like it's early spring. Your shoes squelch in the muck.
It starts easily enough. As you make your way deeper, though, you'll start run into things that make the maze… harder. Gigantic flowers block the way down one path, and they titter together as you get close, swaying and moving in ways that flowers shouldn't. If you do get too close, a flower lurches forward and snaps its petals around you like jaws. Are those teeth?! They're like foot-long cactus spines, sharp and deadly. You might want to get out of there, and fast. The teeth hurt, and the inside of the flower isn't a cakewalk either. It hurts your skin, and if you're in there too long, your skin may start to burn off.
Down another path are more flowers. These are smaller, and oddly fleshy in color and scent. At the center of each flower is an eye. Some of them seem familiar, although you can't figure out why. As you pass, the eyes roll, following you closely. If you make eye contact and any of these flowers, you feel a chilling wave of fear that roots you to the spot. Your stuck in its gaze, staring back at it as it stares impassively at you. You have the horrible feeling that if you stay here, something awful will happen. It grows worse and worse, more acute, but no matter how strong that fear, you can't move your feet. Someone, or something, has to break your eye contact with the flower.
At a final turn in the maze, the sweet, soft scent of lilacs fills the air. You're sure that scent means you've found the end, and that you should follow it. Naturally, it doesn't. It leads to a dead end. Again. This one, at least, is beautiful: it's a little meadow surrounded by hedges, blooming in lilacs and lavender and little purple-headed poppies. The scent is heady and overwhelming. It fills you up. It settles into your head like a haze, making it hard to focus. It seems like an amazing idea to just… stay here. Lie down, maybe, among all those nice flowers. Just for a little while, you tell yourself.
Only, it may be more than a little while. The longer you sleep in this lovely little meadow, the more vines and flowers will grow over and around your body. Eventually, they'll make their way into your nose, your ears, your mouth and start to pull you down into the soft earth. Someone's going to have to wake you up and get those vines off unless you want to stay in this maze forever!
When at last you find your way out of the maze, past the treacherous flowers, you set your sights on Wellstone: a town in the first bloom of spring, a light mist making everything dewy and bright.
tl;dr:
- After you leave the cemetery, you find yourself in the maze. There are flowers that are obstacles along your way.
- There are large, flesh-eating flowers full of teeth that want to eat you.
- There are fleshy flowers with eyes in the middle that, if you meet their gaze, hold you with fear.
- There are lilacs that lull you and make you want to lie down and take a nap. If you do, vines will wrap you up, making it very difficult to get out.
- Once you make it through all the obstacles, you can make it out of the maze into Wellstone.
Scent of death
Content warnings: bad smells, potential for body horror
It isn't just the maze blooming with the coming of spring: Wellstone itself has burst into bloom. It seems that everywhere you look, flowers have invaded the town. Sweet snowdrops poke their heads up between cobblestones. Violets wink from shadowed corners. Morning glories climb walls and line windows. They all smell wonderful, good enough to make you want to bend down and take a good, long sniff.
Except for one. Blooming in the courtyard of the Staywell, just in front of the door in a little garden circle, is a corpse flower. The flower is massive: over three meters tall, giant stamen thrusting up to the sky with frilly red leaves around its base.
It's hard to avoid the flower: any time anyone opens the door to the courtyard, the scent enters the lobby, the parlor, the cafeteria. It seems to permeate the Staywell at random times. And the scent is strange: if you try to talk to anyone about it, they don't agree with you on how it smells. And they won't agree on how it affects you.
Smelling the corpse flower makes you feel a little... strange. Its effects vary by person, and even when a person smells it more than once, the effect might change. At first you feel a rush of disgust, then nausea, then--well.
When you smell the corpse flower, you might smell:
Comment below if you'd like a random smell (or feel free to select for yourself). Effects last anywhere from half an hour to an hour. Characters can experience different effects throughout the TDM. The corpse flower will be in bloom the first week of February and the first week of March, and closed the rest of the time.
tl;dr:
It isn't just the maze blooming with the coming of spring: Wellstone itself has burst into bloom. It seems that everywhere you look, flowers have invaded the town. Sweet snowdrops poke their heads up between cobblestones. Violets wink from shadowed corners. Morning glories climb walls and line windows. They all smell wonderful, good enough to make you want to bend down and take a good, long sniff.
Except for one. Blooming in the courtyard of the Staywell, just in front of the door in a little garden circle, is a corpse flower. The flower is massive: over three meters tall, giant stamen thrusting up to the sky with frilly red leaves around its base.
It's hard to avoid the flower: any time anyone opens the door to the courtyard, the scent enters the lobby, the parlor, the cafeteria. It seems to permeate the Staywell at random times. And the scent is strange: if you try to talk to anyone about it, they don't agree with you on how it smells. And they won't agree on how it affects you.
Smelling the corpse flower makes you feel a little... strange. Its effects vary by person, and even when a person smells it more than once, the effect might change. At first you feel a rush of disgust, then nausea, then--well.
When you smell the corpse flower, you might smell:
- The most delicious thing you can imagine. You're suddenly extremely hungry and feel compelled to eat as much as possible.
- The most wonderful, nostalgic scent. You feel compelled to proclaim your loyalty and friendship to the next person you see.
- The most relaxing thing. Your body feels loose and relaxed and you feel at peace. You want to spread the love and feel compelled to get everyone else around you to chill the fuck out.
- Sugary sweetness. You feel an intense draw of affection toward the people around you and feel compelled to compliment them in increasingly over the top ways.
- The scent of raw, rotting meat. Everything around you suddenly look strangely... meaty. Is that chair made of meat? That wall? You're very acutely aware that you are made of meat, and that everyone around you is made of meat.
- The smell of death. You feel a horrible, creeping sense of guilt and feel compelled to confess something awful you do or do not remember doing to the next person you see.
Comment below if you'd like a random smell (or feel free to select for yourself). Effects last anywhere from half an hour to an hour. Characters can experience different effects throughout the TDM. The corpse flower will be in bloom the first week of February and the first week of March, and closed the rest of the time.
tl;dr:
- There's a corpse flower blooming in the courtyard of the Staywell.
- When you smell its scent, you'll smell a scent that makes you do--something! Select from the list what you'd like to happen, or comment below for a random effect.
no subject
He holds on and looks straight ahead. Too much movement would waste what he has left. He releases his hold on the last drops of his magic. The flight is over before he knows it and he closes his eyes. He stands for a moment then slowly sinks to his knees.]
I need. A moment. Survived…reset.
no subject
Not, not here, dear. Diluc, dear -- if you collapse right on the steps, you know I won't be able to carry you myself! Tell me what's wrong, are you injured-?
no subject
He can do this.] No.
Tired. [Two words is better than nothing. He starts up the steps. As he gets closer to rest the glowing edges of his hair finally fade back to the fiery red they usually are. But the gem on his belt is the dimmest it has ever been. A pale red glow compared to the vibrant colors of before.]
no subject
We'll have you lie down here in the parlor, alright? Stairs be damned. I'll do up a healing spell, just in case? Just in case, yes. Come along now. Knees up, lest you trip--
[she coaches him along the way whether he needs it or not - it's as much for herself as him, ultimately - and guides him past the foyer into the restored parlor. she'll worry on what's new or the same later, for now she just means to set him down on one of the larger couches.]
Right...here, you can settle in here as you please. Get comfortable before I lose you, alright? So you don't regret it waking up.
no subject
He closes his eyes.] I survived through the avalanche on my magic alone.
[Which is most of it. He has the last dredges of his magic left.] On my last reserves.
Magic is…life. If it runs out, then we’re lost. I’m not lost.
no subject
You don't need to speak right now. If you're safe, then...then you can rest. I can wait. I'll hear what you have to say...and you better say it, or I'll be so cross with you I'll-- [she stops herself, her voice having sped up with some anxious energy that she cuts off.
she exhales, closing her eyes and just focusing on the spell instead. she hates this. even climbing out of graves, out of hells, she has to keep seeing people she cares about so haggard and stripped to their limits.]
no subject
The flame within still burns. He is still alive. He leans into her hands. He is on the edge of consciousness and he lets himself fall over the edge. Letting Cecelia keep him safe.
He doesn’t imagine a void. He imagines the wind rolling through green grass and high cliffs. Of the rustle of trees in the breeze. Safe.]
no subject
she still needed to find Darin. Flynn, Yuri, Palamedes...so many.
instead, she slumps, sitting on her legs, forehead pressed against the couch cushion, and finishes her spell and her little bout of weakness. but only for a moment. after that, it's back to proper work.
he'll wake when he is compelled to, and when he does, he'll have had his shoes taken off (set on the floor beside him) and his face and hands wiped clean, his hair somewhat detangled where it isn't crushed under himself, and a light blanket draped over him.
for her part, she can't keep vigil for endless hours, not with the worry for others. so there's a note left curled into one of his hands, letting him know where he can find her.
Fourth floor
West wing]
no subject
He carries a tray with him of cups of coffee and sandwiches. It’s a lot of sandwiches. More than she could eat.] Hey.
[His voice is deeper and raspy. He really shouldn’t be up but he couldn’t go to his own bed yet.]
no subject
she hasn't decided if she's consoled or disturbed by that yet, and she's checking one of the boxes with the wanted posters in them when she hears footsteps and stops to watch the doorway. her sharp-eyed expression softens quickly at sight of him, relief hitting her hard.
she almost laughs to see the tray, just shaking her head with a gentle smile. it wouldn't be him if he didn't show up with some kind of treat or drink, right? that is consolation, Staywell.]
Did you make those or find them already prepared? [she closes the box, moving to clear a space on one of the writing desks.]
no subject
Archons he needed the energy so bad.] It’s my recipe for any mage that needs energy.
no subject
Doing your due diligence to ensure there's a witness to you taking care of yourself...I like it. Good technique.
no subject
As I said, I survived the storm. I survived the destruction of Staywell. But, something happens after that.
no subject
After the snow came crashing in... What did you see?
no subject
I didn’t have any means of flight to prevent my fall. I woke up in a grave in the graveyard with my magic still active.
no subject
void...dark...
was it like what John spoke of...?]
...Did you sense anything from that void?
no subject
[A body wants to give out. He didn’t let it. His magic is powerful when unleashed to the full extent it can.] …to my knowledge that’s the first time I’ve ever do such an act. I don’t feel any sting in my memories to indicate otherwise.
no subject
[her expression gets cloudy, her eyes downcast.]
After all our talk of...not burning out, Diluc...
no subject
In the moment the snow began to break through the levels above me. I felt…there was never a better moment for me to take a risk and see what I could.
I can’t protect anyone if I don’t know what to protect them from. And we can’t get out if we don’t kick down the walls of our possibly living prison. For me, things changed with the possibility we might be being devoured.
I won’t go out if I can help it, but I accepted the risk.
no subject
slowly, she nods.]
...I know. I understand. [she looks up.] I don't like it, but I understand. [her mouth tugs on one side.] Though...it goes without saying, doesn't it? There's little about these grim ends to enjoy.
no subject
We kept reaching further and further. We will find a way forward. [The flame within the depths of his eyes burns hotter and brighter than ever before.]
no subject
Things are changing more than they are repeating, I think. [she gestures slightly.] This room, for example...all the modifications Darin and I had made remain, and everything was in its proper place. Previous times, things would be in disarray or scattered among other rooms.
no subject
Or is that our weapon?
no subject
Whether intended to or not, we have made enough of an impact as to change things. Or make things here adapt to what we do. And if we can press our influence enough...that's a threat, isn't it?
no subject
Like a dragon slumbering in their cave.] I suspect our doubles are not truly us. I think they’re fakes made to resemble the memories still in the possession of what has them.
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/thread?