In the Night Moderators (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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memesinthenight2019-06-14 11:39 pm
inthenightmods) wrote in memesinthenight2019-06-14 11:39 pm
Entry tags:
TEST DRIVE MEME #1
TEST DRIVE MEME #1
Hello and welcome to the In the Night test drive meme for June! Thanks for your interest in our game! Reserves open on June 20, and applications open on June 22.
While you're here...
- Take a look at our rules and faq pages to familiarize yourself with the game.
- Note that we have a reserve/application cap of
20 apps per month(this has been waived for the first month!).- TDM threads can become game canon if both players wish. If the situation isn't something that could happen in-game, you're free to chalk it up to some strange hallucination, a shared dream, or other mysterious circumstance.
- Note that this is not limited to new characters threading with characters already in-game. If current players wish to thread out the TDM prompts as canon events, they are welcome to do so.
- Though threads can become canon, they cannot count toward AC.
- If you plan to apply, please keep in mind that we do require at least one sample thread on the application to be from our TDM (though it doesn't need to be the current TDM).
- You're welcome to use the provided prompts or come up with something on your own, but we do ask that all threads take place in our game's setting.
Thank you again, and we hope you'll choose to join us!
log prompts
YOU'RE DEAD, JIM
You haven't been in Beacon long when you find yourself in Bonfire Square, staring into the flames and thinking about how you ended up here. Maybe it was an accident, a sudden freak thing that you never saw coming until you woke up on the ferry, or maybe it's a miracle you made it as long as you did. Maybe death was a relief. Maybe it was just your time. Whatever the case, you can't help but reflect on your final moments as you linger in the firelight.
But however you died, it's behind you now, and you're here, stuck in this little town with just a few buildings and a smattering of other people. You're going to be here a while, so you may as well get to know your neighbors, but... Would it be cathartic to commiserate about your deaths? Or is your time better spent stocking up at the general store? Then again, you've got plenty of time, so why not catch a drink or two (or three) at the Invincible? Pretend you're unaffected by your death, and, well. Fake it 'til you make it, perhaps.
Point is, you have options. You're dead, you died, and this is your "life" now. Better get used to it.
AND THEY WERE ROOMMATES
Currently, there's only one place to live (technically speaking) in Beacon: the Invincible, a tavern and inn located in Bonfire Square. Luckily, the place has working amenities (minus light), and the forest spirits don't charge anything for your stay. Unfortunately, it seems there may not be enough rooms for everyone. Guess you'll have to get cozy!
Maybe you'll try to pick a roommate from around town or in the bar downstairs, or maybe you'll just walk into the first room you see and choose that way. Want a room all to yourself? Get ready to fend off any potential intruders. And the fun doesn't end there.
The Invincible's rooms aren't all created equal. Some may have had their furniture stolen or become a dumping ground for unwanted pieces, resulting in a single bed, five dressers, and other equally distressing situations. Will someone sleep on the floor? Will you nail two beds together to form bunk beds? Maybe you just want to make this room into something more like home— potentially to your roommate's chagrin. Whatever you decide, this is where you're staying for now, so you might as well get comfortable.
network prompts
HACKER VOICE: I'M IN
In order to use the network, you have to register a username. Er, at least, that's how it's supposed to work. For some reason, new users have recently been able to bypass that requirement, allowing them to post anonymously. Time to troll strangers on the magical internet!
Eventually though, you'll need a username in order to use the tablet's other functions, like the direct messaging system. So hey, why not take advantage of the ability to source opinions, and workshop your potential usernames on the network? Share ideas, get feedback, steal ideas, critique others, and figure out what you want everyone to call you.
TURN ON YOUR LOCATION
When you wake up, you're in the woods. An iron shackle complete with a chain leashes you to a tree, and the only light you have is your lantern. You've never seen this area of the woods before. You certainly didn't go to sleep here.
Hm.
But, all is not lost. You find your phone in your pocket, as well as a scrap of paper covered back to front in cryptic scribbles. Are these clues to your location? They must be. You also spot a key dangling from a branch, though it's hanging from a tree you'll never be able to reach from here. Perhaps someone on the network will be able to lend you a hand...
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no subject
You've got a point, but if there's anything dangerous in these woods I'd like more between it and me than a tarp. Not that I expect to sleep for awhile.
[ He shifts a little closer, lantern clanking gently against his armored arm as he peers at the setup. ]
These are good knots.
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point of the matter is, he wouldn't know what to do with himself if he weren't somewhere between danger and safety an' the souls taken refuge there. maybe that's why he's out here, much as anythin' else. it's his job. gene don't have a fear for his immortal soul, he knows where he's bound with a single-minded certainty anyhow, an' the worse this place can do is kill his physical body again so far as he knows.
he smiles a bit, shakes his head. )
Runnin' joke that us paratroopers don't pass muster unless we're surrounded by somethin'.
( just paratrooper things. it's also half an easy reply to that comment about his knotwork. if the fella is from any iteration of earth — suit of armour or not — then odds are he'll make the connection.
'course, no sayin' he is, either. he's met a fair few folk from other realms that'd make that hardware look right at home, an' all this in the few days he's been here. )
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Whether or not he can, with potential threats unknown, remains to be seen. ]
Paratroopers?
[ It takes him a moment to place the word, as it's been out of use for probably hundreds of years where he's from. Wash isn't from Earth, actually. But it is the human homeworld and he does know plenty of its military history, and recognition lights in his eyes only a second later, followed by a slight grin. ]
No wonder you're not worried. Some of my closest friends were ODST, nobody's got nerve like a Helljumper. [ There's a sudden and surprisingly intense gutpunch thinking about Maine and Ephemera that Wash shakes off as quickly as he can. Before he can start wondering if they survived, before he's crushed under the grief of knowing how slim the odds are. ] So uh... that's what, twentieth century Earth?
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Yeah, that's right. 1945 if we're splittin' hairs. ( most folks he's met have been from well after. near a century or more. it's played hell on his homesickness that there ain't more folk from a place and manner of his remembering, but. humans are humans in every age, so it ain't so bad as all that. )
Acronyms ain't never been my strong suit. Mind tell what 'ODST' stands for?
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2556 for me. Before I wound up... somewhere else, anyway. Can I sit?
[ He's not letting his guard down exactly, but they might as well spare their necks if they're going to chat. When the stranger nods Wash shifts a little closer and eases himself to the ground, setting his lantern and helmet gently to either side. ]
It's 'orbital drop shock trooper.' Same idea as a paratrooper, except they're jumping from low planetary orbit. Absolute badasses, every last one of them. Never scared of anything. [ Wash ducks his head, looking almost sheepish that he wasn't one of them. Wouldn't have made the cut. ] I've never done a jump quite like that.
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gene ain't really an imaginative sort. he can hardly fathom what the world might look like in a hundred years, much less any more than that. an' the way he says, low planetary orbit so casual, like it's just a way of life for him. lordy.
the fella sits down, and gene bustles around the little tent to make some manner of welcome for him. just about all he's got to offer is camp coffee rousted from one of his k-rations, but it's hot and it's acrid, which is about all anybody can ask of the beverage. as he presses the tin cup at the man in the armour — )
Name's Eugene, by the by. Eugene Hicks. ( a pleasant, acknowledging tip of his head. ) Don't figure myself for a badass, but I'll take the compliment all the same.
( though shock troops puts him in mind of the german purview with their stoßtrupp, an' maybe that ain't so favourable as all that. but he's sure the fella means it well. )
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At least a lack of further questions means Gene can pace himself with the mind-blowing information. Wash accepts the little tin cup with a surprised blink, like he hadn't been expecting to be offered anything. Like he's disused to hospitality in general. ]
Thanks... Eugene. I'm Washington, my friends call me Wash.
[ Not that he'd call anyone here a friend yet, but only enemies use his full "name" and he figures he's on edge enough already, there's no need to add to it just because they aren't familiar yet. He takes a sip of the coffee and smiles faintly. ]
Six hundred years and the coffee rations still taste the same. Go figure.
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Well, mine call me Gene.
( or genie, but. that's from his family, an' reggie too on top of it. he ain't heard it aloud in a while, an' thinks it might hurt given voice. reggie's been dead since the latter half of '43 but he ain't barely had time to process it. for years now it's always been about the next jump, the next fight, the next time someone hollers medic into the cacophony of shellbursts and bullets an' tracer rounds lightin' up the sky. on furlough there was always a distraction to be found. he worked in hospitals, surgeons in london didn't care what you were doin' with yourself so long as you could help hold a man down and didn't flinch at the sight of blood and bone or the smell of a split-open gut.
lord. he leans forward until his elbows are planted on his thighs, laces his hands together. now ain't the time to think on reggie. )
Looks like the army's upped its engineering ante at least.
( a nod to the armour the fella's wearin'. coffee might taste the same, but. that's sure new. )
Provided you're some semblance of American?
( wouldn't surprise him none to learn otherwise. empires rise an' fall just the same. he's spoken to ghosts that mourned the fall of rome, but no institute built by man is meant to live forever. )
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[ To his credit, Wash immediately realizes that Gene wouldn't know that term, and clarifies. ]
That's shorthand for floating around in space, sorry. And is probably as good a lead in as any to how I'm not technically American. Humans have colonized the galaxy and I was born on another planet entirely -- the culture is probably close, but our government is really different in the future. You've established the United Nations by 1945, right? They run the show for most of humanity, as the United Earth Government and the UNSC.
[ It's not that simple, of course, but they're not talking about the messy parts... yet. Wash takes another sip of his coffee, shrugging. ]
No guarantees my universe is the same as yours, though.
no subject
he tries to imagine it. a universe where humans have left earth an' landed on other... planets? near distant stars? lordy. he takes a deep breath, chooses to focus on the familiar for now. he can ask reggie about the other stuff later.
(but he can't, can he? reggie ain't here with him. first time in three years they've been separate.) )
Ain't got nothin' but respect for the Marines. My brother's one. An' we don't have any sort of parliament of nations, but I can see where the need might arise after my war's fought an' done.
( my war. he don't really mean for it to be a claimant thing, but. it is, in a way. he an' wade are the only folks here that had their boots on the ground. it doesn't bother him that it's faded to memory for so many others, but it makes him... protective, almost, of what the men and women of his time experienced. )
An' no, no. I know that rightly enough. Seems like there's a lot of things what set these... universes? apart.
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He decides not even to go there, for now. It's too complicated, and probably too close to home for both of them. He's been avoiding talking about that kind of thing, so far. ]
Some times the differences are more obvious than others. Or it all sounds exactly the same, until a certain point in history where things went differently. The place I was in before... this... there was a lot of that going on. Took awhile to wrap my head around, honestly.
no subject
Some other form'a purgatory, or somethin' else than that?
no subject
Of course, he himself is still armed to the teeth. He doesn't have much ammo left, but two loaded firearms and a plethora of knives on his person. 600 years later and some things just don't change. ]
Something else. I did think I was dead when I first woke up there, but I was wrong. We were just all pulled there by... [ He hesitates, wondering how to explain this to someone who doesn't know technology or magic. Uhhhhhh. ] This is going to sound even crazier than being from the future, and I don't have much by way of proof. You still want to hear it?
no subject
It ain't your job to convince me, fella, it's my job to believe. You go on an' tell your story.
( he's an easygoing sort, an' mostly he doesn't believe that a soul's first inclination is to lie. what benefit would it serve? ain't a one, in the here an' now. an' if this is purgatory, lyin' would only further entrench a soul in it. )
no subject
Everyone in Hadriel was pulled in by the Door. It was alien technology, or magic, different people called it different things but it reminded me of teleporters back home... except it wasn't just reaching across time and space in one universe, but different realities too. Some people there called them planes, others said dimensions, the terminology's never going to line up with so many different perspectives but however you want to think of our worlds, the Door could reach all of them. It did pull in a bunch of people who had died, too, like... their essences? And gave them new forms.
[ It's then that he pauses, setting his cup down and drawing one of his throwing knives to try the pate. Why not, he's dead already and it was kind of Gene to offer. ]
If I didn't remember dying so clearly this time, I'd think this was either a mistake or another interdimensional kidnap job. I guess it still could be.
no subject
he has a hope that malachi got out of it, though. he weren't hurt too bad, just bloody.
it is a lot to take in, as wash expects. and gene is quiet a spell before he shifts. )
Universe is full'a all manner of queerness, huh?
( but wash feels genuine about it. what good would disbelief serve? after all, they're here, ain't they? )
I'm sorry, though, about the dyin'. Ain't an easy thing to bear. Was it in this place? Hadriel?
no subject
For a moment he has no idea how to take it, he's so used to people -- even most of his friends when they'd showed up -- rejecting what he tells them. He'd never been an authority on anything, not at home or in Hadriel, so of course there's always been pushback.
Gene has thrown him for quite a loop by just accepting it, though Wash supposes it's possible he's just being overly polite again and doesn't actually believe a word that just came out of his new acquaintance's mouth.
Hard to tell. ]
Yeah, it was another war. My third, it seems like I just can't escape them.
no subject
so maybe he can't do that any more, but. he can still help out in his own way bein' here. gene sits back on his bedroll, fingers laced. that he's sympathetic couldn't be a sight more obvious — the furrow to his brow, the line of his jaw. most soldiers ain't about that, an' marines even less so if al's any indication to the rest of 'em, but. it's always in him to offer it up. )
Well. For what it's worth, I hope you can find some semblance o'peace here. Much as anyone can. Sounds like you've had a hard road, fella.
no subject
Guess so. But even if I deserved peace, I don't think I'd know what to do with it.
[ He's pretty sure this place will start putting them through the wringer soon enough, anyway. Monsters emerging from the darkness to tear them apart, mind games to get them to turn on each other, or maybe something really creative. Why should death be any different than life, especially when they still have bodies? But for Gene's sake he keeps that to himself, passing the tin back and picking his half-finished coffee up again. ]
You seem pretty peaceful already. Is that new?
no subject
( trauma begets trauma. it's a cycle of violence he knows from a lotta the boys in his unit — the great war produced a lotta great men, an' yet soon as the doors are closed and the liquor's up in their blood, that greatness falls away. lord, he hopes it won't be the same for his generation. yet, human nature always is the same, inn' it? )
Me? Ah. Well — ( a slight laugh, a tip of his head. ) No, it ain't new. Guess I've just always been like this, one way or another. Ain't a lot in the world that stirs me to fuss.
( his lot ain't to trouble himself, an' he rarely does. there are so many things in the world what could break a man wide open, but. he takes things as they come. the good — of which he's had plenty — an' the bad — of which he's had his share. but death is just a step along the way, an' his convictions hold fast there. )
no subject
He doesn't argue, just lets the corner of his mouth quirk up at Gene's response to the question. ]
Must be nice. I tend to get pretty fussed. Most people I knew did, too, except maybe... [ He trails off there, then shakes his head. He doesn't want to talk about his dead friends if they aren't even here. ] Is it nice?
no subject
( it's the tiniest little flash of humour, there an' gone. it ain't a trait of his what shows its head often, more around like-minded men. that wash is from hundreds of years in his future ain't a point of contention for him. he may have a hard time fathomin' a thing like a space ship, or an orbit, or folks bein' dropped outta said orbit to the ground below, but time? oh, gene understands the passage of time. )
Though there's always time, I reckon.
no subject
That's definitely something. I'd keep avoiding one if I were you, I don't think this place stocks antacids.
[ He tilts his head, then, peering into Gene's makeshift tent. ]
Unless you have a stash of your own, you seem to have come in with way more useful gear than I did.
no subject
Well, I found the tarp.
( his tone's a bit dry. touched on with good humour. 'scavenged' is maybe a better word. )
I guess the rest, just got used to carryin' around. No Tums to speak of, sadly.
( he was a bit of a packrat besides. never know what you might need an' when you're twenty miles back from the nearest aid station, an' havin' that one thing could mean the difference between life an' death... hell, he used to pull boot laces off mangled pairs of boots just to have somethin' extra as a tourniquet. ain't no mother of invention like need, an' war drives it hard an' hurtin'. )
Can't say how it'd stack up against the twenty-seventh century, though, lordy. You fellas still smoke?
no subject
I couldn't really say, either, you'd probably need a historian to talk about how medicine's developed. But sure, people still smoke. Giving up vices goes against human nature, I guess.
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