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1.0 Test Drive Meme
1.0 Test Drive Meme
Premise & Arrival ֍ FAQ ֍ Apply ֍ Navigation
Welcome to Well! Characters arrive the same way every month. Your character arrives with only a handful of memories, clad in old west style clothes of your choosing, with 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.
Applications open on January 20th, and the game opens on February 1st. Invites are available for members of the mods' plurk lists.
Put on your dancing shoes
Content warning: Alcohol, intoxication, altered mental state
Something’s happening at the Cactus Pad Saloon. It’s lit up bright against the growing night, and music spills out onto the street. Seems like a fun time that you should check out. In fact, it’s hard not to check it out: the closer you get, the stronger the urge to join the fun. If you’ve been spending a lot of time alone, you’ll feel even more compelled to come get a drink.
The bartender serves up anything you can think of: from whiskey to apple juice to blood, if that’s your preference. She doesn’t blink an eye, no matter what’s ordered. The funny thing is, no matter what you order, once you take a sip, the world feels a little easier to deal with, your worries seem to melt away. You’re flush with sudden confidence.
If you strike up a conversation with the person next to you, conversation flows like you’re talking to an old friend. You feel a sense of kinship, deep and meaningful, good or bad, that bonds you together.
The old record player is playing a fun ditty, and the longer you stick around, the more you’re tempted to join, or start, the dancing. Whether you’re a great dancer or you have two left feet, you find that you feel capable of dancing like no one’s watching. No one knows you here, after all. You barely know yourself, so why not draw a partner into the fray? A party’s better together!
If you end up staying there til closing time, the bartender kicks you out with a gruff “come back tomorrow,” leaving you to stumble home with your new best friend. What was their name again?
Something’s happening at the Cactus Pad Saloon. It’s lit up bright against the growing night, and music spills out onto the street. Seems like a fun time that you should check out. In fact, it’s hard not to check it out: the closer you get, the stronger the urge to join the fun. If you’ve been spending a lot of time alone, you’ll feel even more compelled to come get a drink.
The bartender serves up anything you can think of: from whiskey to apple juice to blood, if that’s your preference. She doesn’t blink an eye, no matter what’s ordered. The funny thing is, no matter what you order, once you take a sip, the world feels a little easier to deal with, your worries seem to melt away. You’re flush with sudden confidence.
If you strike up a conversation with the person next to you, conversation flows like you’re talking to an old friend. You feel a sense of kinship, deep and meaningful, good or bad, that bonds you together.
The old record player is playing a fun ditty, and the longer you stick around, the more you’re tempted to join, or start, the dancing. Whether you’re a great dancer or you have two left feet, you find that you feel capable of dancing like no one’s watching. No one knows you here, after all. You barely know yourself, so why not draw a partner into the fray? A party’s better together!
If you end up staying there til closing time, the bartender kicks you out with a gruff “come back tomorrow,” leaving you to stumble home with your new best friend. What was their name again?
Sand trap
Content warning: Quick sand, potential drowning in sand
You step through a door into a room you didn’t mean to enter. You were trying to head into the saloon, or your hotel room, or the bathroom, and instead you’re here: in a small, tight, windowless room in a white-washed building. The air here is old, stale, and thick. Hazy gold light bounces off the walls, but you can’t tell where it’s coming from, since there’s no visible ceiling. The walls just stretch up and up into bright nothingness.
Someone else is there, too, coming through an identical door on the opposite wall. Both doors snap shut, and won’t open again, no matter how hard you try. They won’t even break.
This might not be so bad, except that a sound starts to fill the space: sand, trickling down the walls. It’s just a dusting to start. It comes sprinkling down above, seeping through the cracks in the door. The longer you stand there, the faster it comes: sand flows down the walls in massive torrents, building up on the floor, shifting and thick, trapping you in place.
The only way out is up. When you look again at the walls, you’ll notice it: about 10 feet up the wall hangs a flimsy rope ladder, half-hidden by the waterfall of sand. You’ll have to work together to even reach it, or maybe let the ever-growing pile of shifting, slippery sand lift you up? Be careful, because even if you manage to reach the rope, you both have to get out of here, and the longer you’re here, the faster and harder the sand falls. The ladder seems to go on forever, tens of feet up an endless wall. The better you work together, the closer the top seems. No matter how well you collaborate, they're at least 50 feet high.
When you’ve fought your way through the sand and reached the top of the ladder, you finally see it: the sand is coming in through the open windows of a steeple. You can’t see where it’s from, not really. You can’t see much of anything, but it’s clear: the only way out is, well, out. You have to jump, trusting that yourself and your companion will be safe.
Once free, you land together outside of one of the buildings or rooms you were trying to enter, like nothing happened at all. It’s a calm day, after all.
You step through a door into a room you didn’t mean to enter. You were trying to head into the saloon, or your hotel room, or the bathroom, and instead you’re here: in a small, tight, windowless room in a white-washed building. The air here is old, stale, and thick. Hazy gold light bounces off the walls, but you can’t tell where it’s coming from, since there’s no visible ceiling. The walls just stretch up and up into bright nothingness.
Someone else is there, too, coming through an identical door on the opposite wall. Both doors snap shut, and won’t open again, no matter how hard you try. They won’t even break.
This might not be so bad, except that a sound starts to fill the space: sand, trickling down the walls. It’s just a dusting to start. It comes sprinkling down above, seeping through the cracks in the door. The longer you stand there, the faster it comes: sand flows down the walls in massive torrents, building up on the floor, shifting and thick, trapping you in place.
The only way out is up. When you look again at the walls, you’ll notice it: about 10 feet up the wall hangs a flimsy rope ladder, half-hidden by the waterfall of sand. You’ll have to work together to even reach it, or maybe let the ever-growing pile of shifting, slippery sand lift you up? Be careful, because even if you manage to reach the rope, you both have to get out of here, and the longer you’re here, the faster and harder the sand falls. The ladder seems to go on forever, tens of feet up an endless wall. The better you work together, the closer the top seems. No matter how well you collaborate, they're at least 50 feet high.
When you’ve fought your way through the sand and reached the top of the ladder, you finally see it: the sand is coming in through the open windows of a steeple. You can’t see where it’s from, not really. You can’t see much of anything, but it’s clear: the only way out is, well, out. You have to jump, trusting that yourself and your companion will be safe.
Once free, you land together outside of one of the buildings or rooms you were trying to enter, like nothing happened at all. It’s a calm day, after all.
Memories of the living
Content warning: Cemetery, contemplating mortality
Dusk settles purple over Wellstone. Early stars are out, the moon is thin, and you find yourself inexplicably drawn to the graveyard. You can resist, but the more days you do, the harder it gets. The graveyard is calling to you in a voice you can’t hear.
While it seems small before you enter, once you start walking through the crumbling graves, it seems to stretch endlessly. You pass elaborate dust-covered crypts carved with strange angels; bleached wooden crosses overgrown with cacti; a crumbling old well, long gone dry; worn-down headstones jut at odd angles. Some graves have old offerings on them, brightly colored beads or candles or framed photos, sun-bleached beyond recognition.
You may have been walking for five minutes or fifty, but when you look around, you can’t see to find the exit. You hear howling, and see the flicker of lights from behind the graves, but you can never find their source, no matter how much you look. No matter how long you spend in the graveyard, the sun never seems to sink lower in the sky. An oppressive sense of being watched grows to the point that you whip around, expecting to find someone there until—
You do. You find each other. Others drawn here to the graveyard, walking among the crumbling stones, will end up by the same headstones. Exploring together eases the watchful feeling just a little, but it won’t help you get out. No, you’re looking for something. The exit? No, you’re sure there’s something more important than that.
If you follow your impulses, you may just find it: a gravestone, weathered, old, with a familiar name on it: yours. Your date of birth can be visible, but the date of death is too weathered to read. You may find an offering there, something small and meaningful to you, a small shiny coin or some bright beads.
Once you find your grave, when you look up, you’ll see the exit. You’re really not that far from it, after all, the rusted iron arch barely a stone's throw feet away. Your companion won’t see it yet. You can make a dash for it, get out of this awful place, or help your companion find their own gravestone. When your companion finds their stone, they will also be able to see the exit. Exiting together will alleviate the impulse to come back to this place. Leaving alone will only draw you back, making it more difficult to find your grave again.
You can take the offerings left on your grave if you want, but the sense of being watched will only grow greater until you’re compelled to return them, and leave another offering of your own.
Dusk settles purple over Wellstone. Early stars are out, the moon is thin, and you find yourself inexplicably drawn to the graveyard. You can resist, but the more days you do, the harder it gets. The graveyard is calling to you in a voice you can’t hear.
While it seems small before you enter, once you start walking through the crumbling graves, it seems to stretch endlessly. You pass elaborate dust-covered crypts carved with strange angels; bleached wooden crosses overgrown with cacti; a crumbling old well, long gone dry; worn-down headstones jut at odd angles. Some graves have old offerings on them, brightly colored beads or candles or framed photos, sun-bleached beyond recognition.
You may have been walking for five minutes or fifty, but when you look around, you can’t see to find the exit. You hear howling, and see the flicker of lights from behind the graves, but you can never find their source, no matter how much you look. No matter how long you spend in the graveyard, the sun never seems to sink lower in the sky. An oppressive sense of being watched grows to the point that you whip around, expecting to find someone there until—
You do. You find each other. Others drawn here to the graveyard, walking among the crumbling stones, will end up by the same headstones. Exploring together eases the watchful feeling just a little, but it won’t help you get out. No, you’re looking for something. The exit? No, you’re sure there’s something more important than that.
If you follow your impulses, you may just find it: a gravestone, weathered, old, with a familiar name on it: yours. Your date of birth can be visible, but the date of death is too weathered to read. You may find an offering there, something small and meaningful to you, a small shiny coin or some bright beads.
Once you find your grave, when you look up, you’ll see the exit. You’re really not that far from it, after all, the rusted iron arch barely a stone's throw feet away. Your companion won’t see it yet. You can make a dash for it, get out of this awful place, or help your companion find their own gravestone. When your companion finds their stone, they will also be able to see the exit. Exiting together will alleviate the impulse to come back to this place. Leaving alone will only draw you back, making it more difficult to find your grave again.
You can take the offerings left on your grave if you want, but the sense of being watched will only grow greater until you’re compelled to return them, and leave another offering of your own.
no subject
Perfectly, thank you, although I find that this place makes me...jumpy. I should have been paying attention to my arms--um.
[ that. Certainly is a lot of jars. Flynn blinks, opens his mouth, and says without quite thinking about it, ] Are you starting a collection?
no subject
A--? [Give him a second to finish shaking off the panic and remember what he'd just been worried about breaking.] Oh. No. Well. Do-- people collect jars?
no subject
[ This seems like the kind of question Flynn should have a confident answer to. One of those basic facts of life: water is wet, the sun is hot, jar collections are....
Normal?
Abnormal? ]
I... don't know.
[ Ignore the frustrated, rueful twist to his mouth. Flynn is probably going to have to get used to saying that, and it makes something prickle uncomfortably inside him to do. ]
Or, if I did know, I couldn't tell you at this point because I don't know anything else either, so for all I know it could be an exceedingly normal thing to do and I should be joining you. Um. Did you have a purpose for them, in mind? Or was it just a—you know, these might be useful, for... reasons?
no subject
[That's something they can Know, surely. True, it's an indistinct nothing, but it's something that can probably be clung to while everything else feels like a wash.]
But it's more they-- [Horatio starts to gesture, then thinks better of it. These poor jars don't need to be put under any further stress, surely.] --look quite compelling, don't they?
[They're jars. Flynn wouldn't be wrong to have the confident answer that they aren't.]
no subject
So, good: maybe. Compelling????? ]
Do they?
[ Way to be polite, Flynn! His own words hit him a second later and he flushes. ]
Well, regardless, let me—here. Between the two of us I'm sure we can get them all back to your room without dropping any. I couldn't find anything else useful in here. I suppose it was a little silly to come into a general store for a sword, but I was hoping...
no subject
That's good. That's basically science.
That does, however, make it a bit more embarrassing to be carefully humoured about the whole thing. Happily(?), Horatio's ears and cheeks are probably too sunburnt to register the flush rushing in now.]
Oh-- no. I don't need-- I was-- One's fine.
[--also. Hold up.]
Sorry, a sword?
no subject
[ Too bad he's already reaching out to take some of those jars come on Horatio let him help he has done literally nothing useful since arriving here he is DESPERATE. ]
Honestly, I would have taken an umbrella or maybe a cane, but no luck there, either. It just seems wrong not to have one.
no subject
Do... you want a cane to stab with, or a sword to walk with?
[There's just a lot to process here.]
no subject
A sword to stab with, ideally, but I'd take anything sword-like. Just... a weapon. Seems useful, doesn't it? With all the danger that's supposed to be here at night?
no subject
It does. [Like the echo of an instinct.] If there's not something a bit-- longer range on offer.
[Not that anyone needed to be building fortifications.
Or did they?
Did people collect fortifications?]
no subject
[ Oh, thank goodness, we're on even ground as we heft these clinking jars toward the register! Flynn peers back over his shoulder, his eyes bright. ]
I suppose that would be useful if we're called upon to defend the hotel, especially since it isn't very defensible on its own.
[ What a thing to talk about next to a stack of breathless brochures expounding on the wonders of the desert... ]
no subject
[Sorry, precious jars, y'all are getting jostled as Horatio sets you down. The word is on the tip of his tongue, stuck somewhere in Greek and Latin, and ot's important to get his arms back to demonstrate the concept of "catapult" as distinct from bow (despite the existence of ballistae).
Really, it's just holding one arm out and aggressively flopping it forward, with a bit of a pantomime of that throwing his other hand far afield. Was it worth almost wrecking the jars?
Yes.]
no subject
...huh. ]
A.... longbow? Or, no—do you mean a long-range spell?
no subject
[Oh no. Words failed, then hands failed, and now words are failing again. What is left??]
A long-range-- do you mean a month?
[How would you use a period of time offensively??]
I would die for this misunderstanding this is so funny
A spell. Magic. You know– it's better long-range, I... I think.
what is memloss if not comedyportunities
Although he has met someone who can move solid objects with her mind, so. Perhaps magic is a little real.
At least real enough to ask:] You know magic?
no subject
Does he know magic? He knows about magic. Everyone knows about magic: it's a fact of life, as true as the air or breathing. There is magic. But does he, Flynn Scifo, wielder of swords and forgetter of everything else important, know magic?
............ ]
I really have no idea. How do you suppose one could figure that out?
no subject
Experimentation.
[If there's any way to understand and elicit latent magic, it's absolutely got to be by means of science. That's got to be the way.]
Give things a go. See if anything sparks.
no subject
Um—couldn't that get... a little dangerous? Magic is mostly used in battle. I wouldn't want to break anything else. This town has seen quite a bit already. But I suppose if we were to try in the desert—
Well. Maybe, if you'd like, I could help you get all these jars back to your room, and on the way we could devise an experiment and see if, um, anything sparks?
no subject
[Right! Time to power through properly buying an armful of jars so that the science can begin! Whether the jar thing is weird feels terribly unimportant because now is the time to test a hypothesis or two!
Including, in the muddle of it, a key question:] Isn't mending things quite important in battle?
no subject
[ Now that he mentions it: it feels a bit like a fact half-forgotten, rolling suddenly back to life. ]
There's magic for fixing, as well. Curing poisons and restoring vitality, things like that. I... believe it's more advanced?
no subject
But also, he's got the inkling that his new jar-accepting friend isn't conjecturing exactly the same way.]
It does seem like you know magic. At least a bit.
no subject
I... don't think that I do. I'm not really anyone special. Well— no, I'm sure that I'm not, because all I seem to know is that I'm from a place that gets forgotten about, and magic is special.
no subject
How do you know? [Give him a second to realize his hyperfocus likely isn't universal.] That you aren't special?
no subject
[ That's right: it is kind of a weird thing to just assume, isn't it? It felt right to say, but... well, what evidence does he have, really? Flynn glances sidelong at a rack of keychains, glittering in the dusty afternoon light. ]
I suppose I don't know for sure. It's... an impression I have. That I don't matter, really, in the grand scheme of things. Or maybe, um, that I would like to matter more than I do?
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this is very crusty but an important thing to establish
INCREDIBLE.....