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Well Mod ([personal profile] wellie) wrote in [community profile] wellcome2023-04-20 02:05 pm
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2.0 Test Drive Meme

2.0 Test Drive Meme

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. This month, there is a strong possibility that those old west style clothes include a pair of jorts or daisy dukes.

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 May onward, and can happen concurrently with other events during May and June. This will be the only TDM for April, May, and June.

Applications are open April 26th until May 1st, and May 27th until June 1st. Invites are available for friends of current players.

All-Night Diner
Content warnings: feelings of euphoria and mild intoxication, exhaustion

There’s banner over the diner's doorway reading Welcome!, with colorful flags drooping in the heat. Inside, the waiter greets you with a wide smile and an announcement:

“Welcome to the Stardust Diner! Pie’s on the house today. Have a seat.”

During the day, the diner is just that: a diner. You can get anything on the very extensive menu, including prickly pear lemonade. The pie is free, and everything else is put on the tab for your room that will never come due, probably. It seems like a shame to eat that pie all alone! Accepting a piece of pie makes you feel like you should share this moment with someone. Luckily all the booths are plush and open, and it’s easy to plop down with a stranger to share this special moment.

At night, the mood shifts. The diner’s neon sign is a beacon against the thick darkness, beckoning you in with blinking lights and a line of text reading FORGET YOUR WORRIES. Inside, country-swing music rolls in time with throbbing red lights. The tables have been pushed aside to make room for a makeshift sticky dance floor, and the atmosphere is intoxicating.

It’s as easy as anything to be swept along with the vibes, the dancing, the intensity of it all. When you start dancing, you really do forget your worries. You forget that you don’t know how you got here and that you don’t may not even know the person beside you; you forget that you’re supposed to be anywhere else except here. Everything feels briefly perfect and beautiful, meant to be, no matter what else is happening to you.

When you stumble outside, it will be dawn, no matter how long you think you’ve been there, and you’ll be exhausted enough to simply curl up right there in the sand and fall asleep. Hope you made a friend kind enough to drag you home, or that someone wakes you up!

tl;dr:
  • The diner is open and the pie is free.
  • If you get a slice of pie, you feel compelled to share it with someone.
  • At night, the diner transforms into essentially a nightclub. The vibes are intoxicating and you can forget all your worries and dance the night away.
  • You can only leave at dawn, and your body will be exhausted. Better get help getting back to your room!

Something’s Coming
Content warnings: blood, blood-sucking, monsters

A few hours after dusk, strange creatures begin to scurry from shadow to shadow, chasing after anything that moves: chupacabras. Large ones. They’re big creatures, the size of large dogs with spikes down their spines and tails, dark and hairless with fearsome teeth. They are everywhere, and they are hungry.

They are indiscriminate in who they try to bite: the biggest among you is just as at risk as the smallest, but the bigger you are, the more of them might come for the fight. No matter where you are, there’s a risk: they seem adept at making their way into buildings. You might find one looming over your bed, resting on your chest, getting ready to bite; one might slip into the diner while you’re dancing and latch on when you’ve forgotten to be concerned.

If a chupacabra manages to bite you, it will suck your blood, and it won’t stop until you’re completely drained unless you do something about it. Having your blood sucked by one is not a pleasant experience, it’s excruciatingly painful and the creatures will do their best to keep you prone while eating their fill. The more they drink, the more exhausted you’ll get, until it’s very difficult to fight them off.

They can be killed or scared off, but the further they are into a fight or into their meal, the harder they are to get rid of. If a chupacabra has latched on to you, you’ll need help escaping!

tl;dr:
  • Chupacabras strike the town at dusk.
  • They want to suck your blood, and are indiscriminate in who they attack. They will try and drain you completely.
  • They can be fought or scared off. It's easier to get rid of them if you have a pal.



The Walls Have Eyes
Content warnings: eyes, trypophobia

There are eyes everywhere. They peer out of cracks in walls, the floor, the grout in your shower, an open cut in your skin. There are even eyes in the craters on the moon, staring down at you unblinking.

These eyes seem familiar, even if you don’t remember them. You feel like you do. You feel a heavy weight settle over you when you look at them, guilt curdling in the pit of your gut.

The eyes belong to someone, or someones, who you’ve hurt or let down. They belong to your greatest mistake, to someone who you left behind, to someone who you regret. The same eyes over and over again, or the eyes of many who you’ve hurt, watching you, judging you, pleading for you to save them or apologize or make up for the mistakes you may not even remember making. You just know that you made them. They eyes don't lie.

The more you ignore these eyes, the more they seem to encroach on you: appearing in the walls, following you around corners, in the creases of your knuckles, the fold of your sheets. They replace the eyes of the people around you, the same eyes staring at you from everywhere you look.

Your skin itches with the constant feeling of being watched. Your head feels tight, and your own eyes feel too full, like there’s too much of you inside your skin. You’d do anything to get away from this feeling.

Soon enough, the mounting pressure explodes: you have to confront them and your guilt and your mistakes, and beg for the forgiveness they’re asking of you. Even if you don’t remember what those mistakes were, or why you should feel guilty, you have to tell someone. If you don't, the feeling will only mount, until all you can see are eyes. Eyes, just eyes.

tl;dr:
  • The eyes of someone(s) who embodies your regret appear in the cracks of the world around you.
  • The more you ignore the eyes, the more of them appear, and the more you feel an intense, heavy sense of guilt.
  • The guilt you feel can be based on things you remember, or things you don't. If it's based on things you don't know, your head will also hurt.
  • The eyes will ease if you admit your guilt, to the best of your ability. Tell someone your guilt, and the eyes will recede.
  • If you don't, your whole world will become eyes.



gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (31)

Three

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-07-17 03:53 am (UTC)(link)
At first, Martin thinks the man standing in the graveyard might need help - something in the way he's just staring off into the distance. There's no shortage of weird things that happen around town, so maybe this guy is just the victim of one more.

He's not entirely sure what to expect when the stranger opens with 'pretend this is a normal question' except for anything but. Feeling skeletons sure wasn't on the list, though, and suddenly it's clear. This guy isn't the victim of some weird thing, the odds are, he is some weird thing.

"Ah. What? No, no - I, uh, definitely can't feel any skeletons?" It's not an intentional question stammered out, but Martin can't help following it up with, "Why? Can you?"
necrolord: =+ (in the array)

[personal profile] necrolord 2023-07-20 12:29 am (UTC)(link)
The guy winces, but in the awkward, smiling way of someone making an embarrassing confession at a party. He scrubs a hand back through his short hair, blows out a breath.

"Maybe a bit. How bad do you think it would be, hypothetically, if I thought I could sort of... see the skeletons in the graves? Would we chalk that up as normal-grade going crazy, or...?"
gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (67)

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-08-09 03:58 am (UTC)(link)
It's weird. It's beyond weird, but at least the stranger seems as perplexed about it as Martin does, and really, is it any weirder than when he arrived and there were eyes everywhere, even blinking up at him in his oatmeal?

"Well... Weird things happen here sometimes. I guess this wouldn't be the weirdest, exactly? And, I mean, I guess if you have the presence of mind to think you might be going crazy, you're probably not?" There's a beat of hesitation. "When you say, you can see the skeletons in their graves, though, do you mean you can like, see them through the dirt see them, or...?"
necrolord: =+ (to the heavens)

[personal profile] necrolord 2023-08-14 05:59 pm (UTC)(link)
"Not see them see them," he agrees, as though relieved to sort this out aloud, "it's more like— you know when you're in a dark room with somebody, and you know where they are, even though they haven't moved in a bit? That peripheral feeling, you know?"

He chews his lip, considers this.

"Suppose it's not much better to say I can feel the skeletons, is it. I'd probably chalk that up as sounding worse. I swear it doesn't feel creepy."
gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (67)

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-08-30 02:47 pm (UTC)(link)
It's a bit concerning, this stranger and his ability to... see, or rather feel the skeletons in the ground and Martin is genuinely unsure which would be worse.

"Yeah... yeah, that's definitely... um. Unique, I guess?" It's probably the kindest way he can describe it anyway. "But, I mean, I guess it wouldn't feel creepy if it's something you could always do?"
Edited 2023-09-30 03:59 (UTC)
necrolord: =+ (in the array)

[personal profile] necrolord 2023-09-30 04:02 am (UTC)(link)
He murmurs unique under his breath, wounded but accepting. He deserves it. That's fair.

"Suppose that's one way to figure things out. See what feels natural, right? Or gives you a splitting migraine to think about."
gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (02)

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-09-30 04:10 am (UTC)(link)
Martin shrugs a little. "Well, yeah. I mean. If it wasn't something you had before you got here, there probably would be... I don't know. Some kind of trigger for it? Like getting bitten by a radioactive zombie or something."
necrolord: =+ (in the array)

[personal profile] necrolord 2023-09-30 04:24 am (UTC)(link)
"To be honest," he admits, "it would not surprise me if we had those out here."

He gestures broadly to the very spooky desert, and more specifically its graveyard. Probably not a reassuring place for this line of thought.

"Nothing on your end, though? No sudden flares of spooky insight? It doesn't have to be bone-related."
gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (34)

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-09-30 04:48 am (UTC)(link)
"I don't think much would really surprise me that much about this place?" Martin tips his head in acknowledgement, and looks out across the sand and the graveyard contemplatively.

He shakes his head after a few moments. "No, I don't feel anything. No spookiness, no... sensing dead people buried in the sand. Nothing. Just normal, creepy desert. That probably has all kinds of weird and dangerous stuff out there that we can't see."
necrolord: =+ (in the array)

[personal profile] necrolord 2023-09-30 04:55 am (UTC)(link)
"Well, if you discover an unsettling superpower, let me know." His tone is light and easy, but there's a disappointed tilt to his smile. He turns back out to the graveyard as though it will make any more sense the longer he stares. "All the better to be ready when the zombies hit. If we're unlucky, I mean."
gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (03)

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-09-30 10:45 pm (UTC)(link)
"You'll be the first person I tell, I promise," Martin answers solemnly. He peers out into the desert, as though trying to spot anything dead up and moving in the dark. "I mean, at least you've got a built in early zombie detection system. That's got to count as some sort of luck. Hopefully that means you'll give the rest of us a heads up if you sense someone deciding it might be time to crawl up out of their grave."
necrolord: =+ (to the heavens)

[personal profile] necrolord 2023-09-30 11:15 pm (UTC)(link)
John tips his head to acknowledge the point.

"You know, not a bad thought. If I ever come around running and waving my arms, maybe keep that one in mind. For now, though... it's downright peaceful."
gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (67)

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-10-01 12:00 am (UTC)(link)
"That's good. That it's peaceful, I mean. At least for now." It relaxes him a little. The stranger seems nice enough, once you look past the spookiness, and there are certainly worse ways to pass the time in pleasant company. Still, he can't help being curious how far the ability goes.

"So... do you, like, hear them or anything too, or have any kind of awareness of who they were...? Or is just that you know that they're there. Like beyond what you'd know if anyone else just walked by any other cemetery and went 'yup, those are graves. There's probably dead things under there.' I mean."
necrolord: == (all that's left)

[personal profile] necrolord 2023-10-01 12:16 am (UTC)(link)
He chews his lip, tilts his head as though listening... then shrugs in defeat.

"No zombie moans or ghostly whispers. It's more like I can hear the absence." That's edging into spooky-weird territory again, and he looks kind of sheepish about it, casts about for a metaphor: "You ever lived in a city? Through the window at night, you can hear all the cars, all the movement, millions of people milling around. Then you get out in the country and it sounds wide-open. You can hear the space around every calling owl.

"I can tell they're peaceful because it feels still, you know? Like a night in the country."
gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (34)

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-10-01 12:33 am (UTC)(link)
It makes far more sense than on the surface Martin thinks it has any right to, and he's not entirely sure how he feels about it, but after a moment, he nods. "Yeah. Yeah, I think I get it. It makes sense that it'd be... I don't know. Noisier, I guess? If they were restless, or up to no good, or whatever. I guess if you're going to sense the dead, it's better to sense the quiet ones."
necrolord: =+ (to the heavens)

[personal profile] necrolord 2023-10-01 02:31 am (UTC)(link)
"If the whispering starts up," he agrees, "that's when we can worry."

But that's maybe enough of that for now. He could look for hours and never pick apart all that's under the earth, he's pretty sure - doesn't have a good enough eye for it yet. John takes a step away from the graves like that'll break this feeling of a trance.

It doesn't, really, but he can pretend.

"Anyway. That's probably enough revelations for one afternoon, eh? I'm John."
gotaknife: by <user name=everchased site="tumblr"> (39)

[personal profile] gotaknife 2023-10-12 09:52 am (UTC)(link)
"Yeah," Martin nods in agreement. To both statements, really, he thinks, but still it's hard to tear his focus away from the graveyard and the bodies that lie beneath the dirt. There certainly is no shortage of mysteries around here.

The introduction is enough to pull his thoughts back to the present, and he glances at John. "Nice to meet you. Martin."