NOVEMBER TEST DRIVE MEME

[sodder]

NOVEMBER 2019 TEST DRIVE MEME

Welcome to November's Test Drive Meme! This month's Test Drive's theme is: DEATH/ZOMBIE HORROR.

All Test Drive Memes contain at least one clue to the Deerington's upcoming in-game events for the month! Keep your eyes peeled! But...not literally.

Characters may die during TDMs, but you do not need to count it towards a game-canonical death unless you want to. Consider it a freebie. All TDMs can be considered game canon as TDMs introduce minor aspects about the world of Deerington that can be revisited by characters later on in the game. You may also use TDMs for your application writing sample as well as AC.

CW: Possible mild cannibalism, organs (including pictures of fake food that looks like organs), mutant insect in linked picture, blood, sensations of starvation, possible binge eating, possible binge drinking.
Don't forget to tag content whenever necessary. Have fun!

Prompt One
Prompt Two
Character Arrival
Master Navigation

NOT BEAST NOR KIN

The blood and organs that have been festering in the ground and walls of Deerington seem to not only be attracting rats at this point, but something far more dangerous and... just plain gross. These deadly looking maggots are roughly the size of an average human. They’re slithering in an out of the ground, filling up holes where some organs seem to have burst open, or writhing around in the wake of the red waves that have left bloody puddles in the street. If you keep your distance, they’re mostly just disgusting to watch, adding to the feeling of utter decay that the town has gone into.

But those who wander too close or who are unfortunate enough to go by a nest of these maggots without noticing could end up swarmed. They can leap farther than something that large should physically be capable of and the sharp teeth on the end of their bodies will pierce through even the toughest of skin and bone. Once they latch on, they won’t let go; not until they’ve finished their meal. If you aren’t quick, the blood loss will be, and you could end up an evening snack for a whole group of these creatures.

They are fairly easy to kill, luckily. Average weapons seem to take them down or you can smash their heads (if you can call it that) with a few good stomps from a boot. The only trouble is how quick they move and how strong they are; you might need to call for help to get away from them when you get cornered by too many of these monsters.

ALL YOU CAN EAT

Maggots aren’t the only things that want to eat, though! And it seems that the community center is aware of that as well. Advertisements are strewn all over town for an all you can eat buffet that will be set up, not even an entrance fee required (though donations are welcome at the door if you’re feeling generous). No one in their right mind would want to go and get food from a party into Deerington at this point though, right? Of course not. You’re way too clever for that.

Except that as the party draws closer, anyone who saw the advertisements will find themselves slowly feeling like they’re starving. There’s a hallow belly feeling that no amount of food you consume will ever be able to fill. It feels like you might go crazy from how bad the hunger gets, craving something to fill your stomach, anything... And in the back of your mind, you might remember the buffet. You might start to feel a strange realization that the food they’re offering will actually help get rid of your cravings and you’ll be drawn to the party no matter how adamant you’ve been that it’s not a good idea.

The spread they offer isn’t something that should be appetizing to most on a regular basis; raw, very clearly human organs are laid out across the table on fairly decorative plates. A fountain of what looks like blood is put up in place of chocolate for you to dip your food into. No matter how disgusted you might normally feel, you find yourself practically drooling at the mouth and you’re quick to grab a plate and dive in.

At least the drinks look like they’re normal; sodas, beer, wine, champagne, and liquors ready to create your favorite cocktails. A menu will give you an idea of what pairs best with each organ, so make sure you select something that goes perfectly with your plate of intestines.

What would a Deerington party be without something tricky attached to all this. Even the smallest bites of any of the organs will offer sudden changes to the consumer, each power growing stronger the more that you eat.

• Eating BRAINS will make it so that you are able to hear another person’s thoughts. Anyone standing near by, really. They’ll trickle in slowly at first, but the more that you eat, the more you’ll hear, and eventually it could become overwhelming. Sometimes you can focus in on just one person if you stare at them intently, but that could make you look like a creep. Maybe you should just go somewhere quiet until it passes.


• Eating a HEART will make you feel compelled to confess your emotions to someone. Maybe a specific person or maybe it’s towards a complete stranger, but you just want to get everything out onto the table. You’re overcome with feelings so strong you don’t know how to contain them anymore and you’ve just got to get them out somehow.


• Eating LIVER will cause you to want to drink. A lot. You might find that you’re not able to get enough, even. It doesn’t make you immune to the alcohol though, so it’s got the potential to lead some pretty nasty alcohol poisoning if you aren’t careful. Characters who usually can’t get drunk will find that consuming liver makes them a total lightweight. Woops. Better have someone help you walk home.


• Eating the STOMACH will make you want to eat everything. You’ll no longer feel starving, but you just want to taste any food that’s near you, and you won’t stop no matter how full you feel. It’s not just organs, but any food consumed outside of the buffet. It might be a bad time to go to Peter’s Pizza for a late night meal.


• Eating INTESTINES will give you an abundance of courage. You’ll find that you’ve got guts you never knew you had and it might make you willing to go tell your crush how you feel about them, or tell off that one guy who’s been pissing you off for weeks, or maybe you might start to think it’s cool to go scale a building or fight a monster when you don’t have any skill sets to actually take one down. Hopefully you don’t do anything you’ll regret in the morning— assuming you don’t get yourself killed doing something stupid, of course.


• Eating EYEBALLS will allow you to obtain the memory of the first person that you touch. Depending on how much you’ve eaten, you may just see a small snippet or you could get sucked in to a full and heavy flashback. The memory will feel like it takes place in real time, but by the time that it’s over, you’ll find that whoever you touched is only just starting to ask you what’s wrong — or tell you to watch where you’re going, buster.


All affects from the food will wear off within about an hour if you’ve only had a bite — or they could last up to twelve if you really stuffed yourself. Please be sure to obtain OOC permission from any players for the brain and eyeball prompts!

Character Arrival

You can read how all characters arrive in Deerington here.

There is not a collective "all these characters showed up at the exact same moment" occurrence in Deerington. Since characters fall asleep, die, or pass out at various times throughout all their worlds, it wouldn't make too much sense if they arrived in game all at the exact same time. There should be some discrepancy between character arrival, whether by a couple minutes, hours, or even days up to a week.

The players are entirely in control of how/when they want to play their characters arriving in Deerington. For TDMs, you can play it like your character has just arrived and that can be maintained as your game canon, or you can wait until game events for that moment. Or you don't need to acknowledge it at all. The flexibility for character allows a bit more of an organic feel to the character arrival situation, so please play it to whatever feels right for you.

If you are interested in having an "arrival" introduction for one of your TDM prompts, you are more than welcome to explore that option.

Comments

ahhhh good!!! it's the best, i loved my recent rewatch

[effinphd]

[Theo's paused to catch her breath, backing away from the teeming, writhing mass of maggots (ew) and wiping guts off her face. They just keep coming, more and more every time she smashes one to gunk, and her arms are beginning to ache. The sudden voice makes her startle a little, eyes flicking towards the street.

First thing she notices -- nice jacket.

Second is that while in general it's a good idea not to get into cars with strangers, that rule might be in need of some bending when there are giant fucking maggots involved. So Theo only hesitates a moment before hopping over a pile of pulverized gunk and into the SUV, only tripping a little. Her boots are cute, but definitely not made for grabbing traction on slippery sidewalks.

One of the maggots tries to scuttle after her, til Theo swings at it with the crowbar a couple times, slamming the door and tearing off one of it's creepy pincers.] ...gross.

[shiro2hero]

Yeah. Over a year.

[His face turns solemn, apologetic. As if this is, somehow, his own personal fault.]

We've been trying to figure out a way home, but -- this town doesn't seem to give us a chance to breathe.

Re: 1.

[saltyadam]

Adam frowned.

"Yes, you said that already." His eyes flick to the doorway behind him.

"Did you-- were you brought here?" Does this... thing actually exist somewhere? Is it possible it isn't some kind of creature created by this nightmare place?

[clussy]

Not so sure angels have anything to do with this.

(Says a young boy just a few feet away. He's got his hands shoved into the pockets of a jacket and he looks a little tired, eyes a bit red tinged. He's shown up for a good time, not a long time, but it turns out the good time wasn't much of an option either given the look of all the food.)

Word of advice...Most of the food is as sketchy as it looks. I usually watch people for a while before seeing if it's safe to eat.

[clussy]

Wha- (Eddie's taken aback by the man thinking he'd be older. Literally every adult he's ever met had pegged him for twelve or younger. Some had done so earnestly- and could he fault them? He was undersized with a baby face. Some adults had demeaned him by throwing out obviously ludicrous ages like six or something. Never older though.

He felt oddly flattered, and looked down at himself, wondering silently if maybe he had gotten taller without realizing it. A pleased flush was working its way into his face. Eddie was at the odd age where he still didn't want to abandon his childhood, but part of him was getting older and liked the idea of people respecting the maturity that came with that. It was a funky middle area to be stuck in.

Eddie sure knows he can't do shit physically to help this guy up, but he's glad to be humored anyway. Dude's hands were definitely as big as they looked.)

Doogie? (He curls his lips around the nickname and stares up at the guy, brow raised.)

Thanks. Sorry I can't really offer you much of happy-anythings. Since I doubt you're that happy to be stuck in Horrorville 2.0.

[discocop]

[He ignores the plate in her hand for the equally disgusting one set in front of him. The one with a heart adorning a pile of other organs, a pinnacle for this mound of madness. The expression on his face shifts in tiny subtle ways. The grin slips from confused to abashed... but it is still a grin.]

I know I shouldn't. In here, you know - [He taps his head.] But here - [He taps his chest. And then his stomach.] It's wrong. It must be. I must be some kind of fucked up. Are you fucked up?

omg i just finished the game and i love it so much...

[discocop]

[Pain. It indicates pain.

Shh. That is a secret.

Actually, the grin is for the ladies, you know. In other circumstances she would be kind of attracted to him. Promise.]

Shit.

[He whirls back toward her as she slips, some primitive part of his brain calling upon dormant primate communal mentality. He won't leave her. He draws a bottle from within the folds of his blazer (he had one in there, yes) and throws it at the creature. It shatters on the pavement about a foot short of the maggot, but at least it sends shards of glass at the creature. By pure luck one of these catches the beast in a beady green eye. It recoils and hisses furiously, momentarily distracted.]

Motherfucker!

[He's partly yelling at the creature, but also partly yelling because he accidentally threw his good bottle of booze rather than the cheap beer one (he has one of those in the blazer too, yes.) The sweet alcoholic nectar is splattered all over the street, streaming away and mingling with blood...

He bends down to her, grabbing her arm to help her onto her feet.]

Come on! Run, lady!

[hylights]

[She has to shudder, wrapping her arms around herself.]

So those really are... how awful.

[Conceptually. Zelda wants to ask how anyone could harvest such food, put it on display like this, expect people to eat it? Only a growing part of her thinks she knows why. Because it's tempting.

Glancing at Larxene again, she has to wonder how the other woman can be so cavalier about this. She even seems to be enjoying herself.]

You don't find any of this shocking?

[hylights]

[There's such raw emotion in Nadass's face, in her admissions. How long has she held this inside? Maybe being in this eerie place has stirred something in her usually left quiet. Zelda reaches out finally and settles her hand on Nadass's shoulder gently.]

I see ... I can't imagine how lonely that must feel. There are no others of your people in this place?

[Quietly, Zelda's been wondering the same about herself, if she was the only Hylian here. Judging by everyone's ears it would seem to be the case. This wasn't about her, though.]

But here. Why don't we get up and find some seats? We can go to a corner if you like.

[It would surely make her feel a little better to be up off the ground.]

all you can eat

[decayings]

Appetizing, isn't it?

( the voice comes from behind him, from a tiny brunette wearing a filthy dress that looks like it once belonged to someone's grandmother -and maybe it did. she was given it at a funeral home, so...- and wearing sunglasses despite the fact that a) they're inside and b) even outside, the sun has dipped well below the horizon. )

Almost makes you want to ask for a to go box, I bet.

( setting her empty glass down, she peers over the spread with a wrinkled nose. it's been weeks since laura moon has eaten anything, a fact that doesn't generally bother the dead. but despite the fact that she hasn't had even the slightest hunger pang in all that time, suddenly she's almost tempted to give the gore buffet a chance. almost. )

You know, I hear brain is a delicacy. Somewhere, anyway.

[hylights]

Is that so? [She sounds genuinely curious herself.] It hasn't been my experience in Hyrule. Things like the Sheikah Slate are well beyond what we can make now. I think the knowledge of the ones who made them has simply been lost over time.

[Zelda shifts and detaches something from her belt - a book-sized object. Turning it over and holding it in her hands, it's clear that the item has a dark screen, with a more stylised design of an eye on the back. Whatever it is, it looks like some kind of iPad.]

We believe items like this are around ten thousand years old. That's what the records we've found indicate.

[deflectere]

Maybe. Maybe this is better than the lives they lead. More exciting, less boring.

[trancheuse]

Absolutely disgusting, but not all that shocking. This place likes to try and be too edgy for you, if you ask me. I've only been here about a month and a half and I already done being shocked by anything.

[She laughed, very much not taking any of this situation at all seriously. Her pearly whites showed when she had the minor decency to wipe her mouth clean.]

Look, there's been organs behind the walls everywhere here. You think all of that comes from the people they say it does, really? How many hearts, how many brains. Bah. It's disgusting, but you're letting it get under your skin. That's the mistake.

[dramaquinn]

[ Uh-oh, nerdy bonding imminent. ]

Something must've happened for that technology to be lost for so long.

[ Or that entire society kept shitty records. Who knows? Looks like everyone could benefit from a library like the Order's.

Alice looks at the device, then holds out her hand for it. It's kind of like one of those super old cell phones, but also it has the screen of... a clunky smartphone. ]

Is that design original? From its time?

[trancheuse]

[Hey, he was eating, one way or another, which was as far as she was worried about this entire situation. Taking another bite from hers, she shrugged in a way that looked deeply nonchalant about the situation that they found themselves in.]

Hahahaha, now now. Language. Children present, somewhere. Even if they're all potty mouths too.

Of course I am. You lose your heart, and you're not exactly normal by anyone's standards who still has theirs.

[onerthes]

[A flare of black fire and one of the things assaulting him screamed an unholy sound as the smell of charred... something came up in a sickly plume of smoke. There was a three eyed woman moving up towards him slowly, a rapier that practically screamed 'cursed' in her hand, a grim look on her pale and unhealthy face.

She wasn't quite up for running.]

Retreat towards me. I'll help cover you.

[deflectere]

It looks terrible.

( shadowhunter food left a lot to be desired but at least it looked edible for the most part. )

Do people actually try and eat this when it looks so bad?

[deflectere]

It's good to see you too.

( and he means that. he really does mean that. he's confused and a little uncertain about this place but he at least knows magnus enough to be confident and comfortable around him.

now. he wasn't always like that and he knows it. he swallows and wipes a hand across his brow. )

I don't think I could have gone without speaking to you even with what I said.

[fuzzbeat]

[ You know what? She'll buy it. Seems solid enough. Tis the season. Etc etc etc. she grabs the plate with a thank you.

What's it like where she's from? Well, that depends on where specifically she talks to. New York is weird but mostly in mundane ways. The Library is... well. It's the Library. The mirror bridge was something else entirely but also, not a place she's from, per se.

She goes for a piece of liver. Fuck it. Puts it right on her plate. When her hand is free, she answers. ]

Similar to what I've seen here so far. There's magic, portals, illusions. We have cell phones and internet and drugs and booze - I would say that's "normal". But then there's things dragons, vampires lurking at parties, magicians who use illusions to keep the IRS off their backs.

[ And then there's her "news" website, Fuzzbeat, masquerading as your standard clickbait site to share restricted knowledge with any magician savvy enough to figure out at least half the articles are covered with illusions. ]

In the neighborhood where I grew up, there are cannibals. So, you know. This is weird. But it's synthetic, at least.

[ Yeah. Sure. ]

What about you? What's your home like?

[discocop]

[Well he's not eating yet. But he certainly looks like he's considering it. His right hand reaches out to hold the heart and lift it near his face. Blood from the organ trails between his fingers, settling into the light scarring on the back of his hand. Tiny bloody rivers crisscrossing over his skin...

The heart is tougher than he expects. It's not at all like holding a part of someone. It's a hunk of meat... ready for consumption.]

This is a heart.

[Whose? Whose heart is he holding? It must have belonged to someone, yes? The thought tumbles slowly through the tangled neurons in his brain. It comes out strange at the end of his tongue.]

I lost a heart too. I guess you and I are both the same that way. Not normal.

[Maybe if he eats this one, it will make up for the loss. No. It's only an excuse. The truth is that it smells delicious and his stomach is an empty cavern of desire.

He leans forward and takes a tiny bite.]

[trancheuse]

Oh, did you now? Went and sloughed off that bit of weakness did you? Well, it looks like it didn't take quite as cleanly if you ask me, but everyone reacts differently to being a nobody.

...no, you're probably not a Nobody. You're probably something different.

[It was weird, but she was pretty sure he was something else entirely, not the byproduct of a heartless corruption and transformation. He looked more broken in a way, where she was still very much mentally intact. Not 'sane' by some definitions, but very stable.]

How's it taste? You won't catch me eating one of those, but paint me curious.

[wwrench]

[Wrench doesn't need to be told that "typical" is a relative experience, but it seems that this place is intent on re-emphasizing the point to him at every turn. Virtually everyone he's spoken to is from a place or has lived through experiences that he thought only existed in stories. Magic, zombies, far-flung planets, folks who refer to themselves as literal gods... If he ever made the mistake of describing his place of origin as "ordinary," Wrench knows now that holds no meaning in a place like this.

As she explains, he glances at the spread. It's rude, but he can't help himself. Despite the raw and bloody look of the organs, he wants to taste them more than he can remember ever wanting anything. Wrench spears a slice of brain, then adds a couple of eyeballs. These are, at least, organs he is particularly familiar with the texture of.]

Northwest United States, 2010. [He lays out the details first, if they mean anything to the woman.] If there was magic, I didn't know about it. [He shapes his thumb and index finger and arcs it at his forehead. Clueless. They share a language, and he knows that's not down to the universal translator in this place. That says plenty.]

You're Deaf too?

[earthlike]

I see. That sort of literal divine presence is not what I'm used to, but I won't doubt that it's the truth of your reality.

He called himself Legolas, of the Woodland Realm. I gathered from our brief conversation that his world was very different from the ones I know, or even this one.

[earthlike]

[ As they leave the banquet hall, Nadass begins to be able to think more clearly. She's still having to filter out the thoughts of the people they pass, but the initial panic is waning. And so, as she follows Harriet down the street, she puts things together to begin to understand the shapes she had made with her hands.

She catches up, walking alongside Harriet and making sure she is within line of sight before asking, ] What you did earlier... Was that some sort of sign language?

[xenoqueen]

[In other circumstances, Ripley might find some offense at being called lady in such a crass manner, but there's no time to argue about semantics. Her hands are stained in putrid blood as she gets dragged up onto her feet. It takes a moment or two before her legs start to work again and she begins to run, jerking away from his grip.

The maggot attempts to give chase, but the booze and glass on the ground seems to inhibit it. As its flesh makes contact with the alcohol, it lets out another shriek and bunches itself up, cringing away from the source of pain.

There--over there! A bar, preferably without organs inside. She gestures for the stranger to follow as she dashes across the street, slamming open the door and stumbling inside. The bartender briefly glances towards the door, unimpressed, before going right back to mixing drinks.]

Jesus Christ. [--Is all she can manage for a few moments as she catches her breath. She moves to rub her face, but then stops when she sees the blood on her hand.

She feels like she might be sick. Ripley closes her eyes, trying to wipe her hands on the wall behind her. Hopefully, the employees won't mind.]

What the actual fuck is going on out there?

[As if this man would know anything about the situation....]