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

Groot | MCU

[flora_colossus]

1. Do Groots Dream of Wooden Sheep?

Groot isn't particularly bothered by waking up in a strange place--he's been through worse. Do you know what he is bothered by, though? Waking up with a buRNING FEELING ON HIS BUTTCHEEK. He climbs out of bed and cranes his head over his shoulder to get a better look, doing a little spin as he realizes he couldn't quite see whatever was there. Frustrated, he gives up and felt for what was causing the stinging feeling. Someone had carved something there. Asshole.

The basket next to his bed contains very little; a mushroom (he threw it in his mouth), a handheld edition of Arcade Defender (he threw it on his pillow), and a few pieces of paper (he threw them on the ground). Some of us have better things to do than sit around and read letters. Things like figuring out whether he's dead, or if the answer to that is no, getting back to the big fucking deal fight he was in the middle of.

"I am Groot?" he calls into the street, hoping for an answer.

2. Groot in the Streets in the town of Deerington
Groot's little feet slosh through blood as he makes his way toward the city center, trying to make sense of what exactly he's walked into. Are those worms in that puddle? Does he recognize those worms? Well, there's one way to find out. By sticking his face right in there.

3. They Eat Groots, Don't They?
There are worse things than an all-you-can-eat buffet of mysterious origin. Especially a buffet with an open bar. Groot does not recognize a single drink at said open bar, but he has sure combined half of them into a single cup. He drops an eyeball into what has to be the most unpleasant garbage soda ever devised before throwing the whole thing back in a few gulps. Wow, that was sure something. Time to try again.

"I am Groot," he grumbles as he clumsily reaches across the table for a bottle of clear liquid with little gold flecks floating in it, knocking over a few other bottles in the process. Aaand there's a partially-eaten chunk of liver on the ground by his little feet, so that tracks.

[lednikovyy]

Bucky's not eating anything here. That's what he thinks when he enters, but the thought is soon forgotten. Liver's really not such a strange food to eat, anyway, is it? He'd eaten a lot of it during the depression, even if it had been processed differently back then.

Food really is so much better now, he thinks as he eats it, but it's only a moment before his mind is on drinks. He's so thirsty and it's the glimmering bottle of Goldschlager that catches his eye first. He snatches it just before Groot does, popping the top off and taking a long swig.

It's not good, but it hits the spot, anyway.

[flora_colossus]

Hey, HEY. That was Groot's Drink™!

"I aamm Grrooot!!" he slurs, reaching for the bottle, but failing to articulate his finger into a grip. The end result is that he gives the bottle a good slap, causing the little gold flecks inside to swirl around the remaining liquid. Maybe grabbing a bottle that is not in somebody's hand and is also not spinning would be easier. He manages to grab a different, less interesting, bottle off the table, even though all of those are spinning as well. He shoves it in Bucky's face, which is also spinning. "IamGroot," he states assertively.

[lednikovyy]

"Groot?" He doesn't seem to mind the flailing or the smacking, but he's a little fascinated by the fact that he's being smacked at by a little tree man. He's seen a lot of shit here. He's friends with the actual devil. For some reason tree-man seems weirder than that. Maybe because it's new.

"I'm Bucky." He offers the bottle of Goldschlager to Groot and takes the offered bottle instead. "Is that what you want?"

Can trees... drink?

[flora_colossus]

He gladly takes the Goldschlager, drinks it straight from the bottle, realizes that it is foul, and spits it out. How is this worse than the last drink? Then he remembers how hard he worked for this, takes another swig, and actually swallows it this time.

"I am Groot." he says, giving Bucky a solid and brotherly pat on the arm.

1

[ace_of_hearts]

"Hi, Groot!" Ace is shirtless, but smiling. Who knows if that means anything good. "I'm Ace!" He bows cheerfully. "Are you new here too?"

Re: 1

[flora_colossus]

"I am Groot," he answers, nodding and imitating the bow, but not the cheer, as he's feeling pretty skeptical about the whole situation here. Wherever here is.

[ace_of_hearts]

"Cool, okay, let's see what we can find out together," Ace nodded, starting to pick up on some of the wariness, because it wasn't so bad on the higher hills, but he could still smell a lot of blood, even if it was leftover from the war he was just in.

Of course had either of them bothered to read the letters in their baskets, they might have saved themselves a lot of time and energy, but who has the patience for reading?

"You pick a direction. Down towards the wharfs, or out to the trees?"

[flora_colossus]

Groot thinks for a second. The trees feel a little safer--maybe too safe. He points to the wharf. "I am Groot," he says, and starts walking in that direction.

1

[onerthes]

"And I am Vira-Lorr!" came the reply from a short distance away. The woman who said it looked more than a little pale right now, but she refused to let herself be cooped up in her home to recover. It wasn't in her nature, even if she did occasionally descend into a fit of hacking while fighting the difficulty of recovering... well, from being dead only a week ago.

She waved towards the tree person as she saw him and offered a weak smile, beckoning him over. "Are you by chance a ryulent?" He didn't exactly look like the creatures from her world, but they were quite varied and she could hope.

Re: 1

[flora_colossus]

Groot tries to think of whether he's heard of a Ryulent. Doesn't ring any bells. "I am Groot," he answers, and he can hear the frustration in his voice. This doesn't give him any idea where he might have wound up, and no one around here seems to speak Groot. But that isn't Vira-Lorr's fault.

He sighs, then holds out his hand.

[onerthes]

"Yes. You are Groot. I am Vira-Lorr. We have established this quite clearly," she said, none of the frustration he might have felt visible in her features. She'd dealt with some curious issues in communication in her time, so she could handle this, right? She pointed to him. "Groot," and as soon as she did that, she pointed at herself and smiled more broadly. "Vira-Lorr."

Reaching out, though, she took him by the hand as he'd offered. Was he wanting to show her something, take her somewhere?

1

[variantcover]

Gwen is out walking her pet land shark, Jeff, when she spies a sentient tree poking his head out from a nearby house. Could it be...?

It is!

Jeff forgotten, Gwen bounds over to Groot. "You sure are! Though you're a lot... Shorter than I'd expect you to be."

Guess who hasn't seen GOTG2.

Re: 1

[flora_colossus]

Groot stares at this magnificent beast. He has seen a lot of things during his four years of life, but never has he seen something so beautiful. Those shapely legs, that beautiful smile...he can't tear himself away.

"I am Groot," he tells Gwen dismissively, too spellbound by Jeff to explain that he is still a growing boy Groot.

[variantcover]

Jeff is too busy digging a hole in Groot's front yard, trying to get to the organs underneath, to notice the sentient tree's attention on him. Gwen does follow his line of sight, however, and immediately runs to chastise Jeff for his naughty behavior.

"Jeff! No! Stop it! Heel! Heel!"

How embarrassing. They say you should never meet your heroes. Apparently that's because your stupid pet shark will do something destructive on their front lawn.

Jeff, admonished but well trained, stops his digging and comes to sit by Gwen's feet. Gwen turns back to Groot to apologize.

"I'm sorry. He just really likes eating the organs underground. I've been trying to get him to stop, but... You know. Sharks."

3.

[laminae]

All-you-can-eat buffets are normally great things, though they're slightly less great when they're filled with some very questionable-looking dishes. They're downright awful when you feel like you're starving and literally can't eat any of the food, no matter how questionable it may be.

Fern hasn't even gotten a drink. He hasn't figured out how alcohol interacts with plants, and the soda brings up bad memories from home, so he's mostly just stuck looking forlorn as everyone else digs in.

That is, until he notices the walking tree downing some concoction with an eyeball tossed in for good measure. He stares, openly, since this is the first other-plant-person he's ever seen in Deerington. It's weird, sort of unsettling since he looks like a smaller version of Darren, whom he distinctly remembers killing, and extremely baffling.

Eventually he gets ahold of himself and wanders over, uncertain of what he's doing. "Dude," he says, deciding to go for the obvious. "Are you from Ooo?"

Re: 3.

[flora_colossus]

Groot finishes pouring himself a new drink--this one is a murky blue-green color with golden flecks and no eyeballs--and turns around. "I am Groot," he answers, shaking his head.

He had been looking forward to tasting this one, like a lot, but this fluffy green guy seems like he could use it more, so instead he holds the drink out to Fern.

[laminae]

Fern squints a little, confused. That's a... no? He isn't sure, though he's never met anyone named Groot before. He'd remember if he had.

"I'm Fern," he responds awkwardly, taking the drink out of habit despite not being able to drink it like a normal person. "So - Ooo? Ever heard of it?"

3. OH SHIT DAD'S HERE

[beatupgrass]

Rocket's immediate reaction to seeing his pseudo-son from across the room is elation. He's practically running on all fours to get across the room to him, only to stop six feet from him when he realizes what's going on here.

Dad Mode activated.

"Put that down or so help me," Rocket snaps, crossing his arms over his chest. Yeah, hi Groot. He'll get to the joy at having you here momentarily, but right now he's making sure you don't get drunk.

CRAP IT'S THE FUZZ

[flora_colossus]

Between the alcohol and the familiarity of the situation, Groot doesn't even realize just how relieved he is to see Rocket. He puts the bottle down and tucks his arms in awkwardly, looking some combination of annoyed and humiliated. "I am GroooOOOOT," he half-grumbles, half-whines, doing his best to shrink into the background.

And then he realizes that he's more happy than he is embarrassed.

He tries not to smile at dad. Now that would be embarrassing.

THE FUZZIEST OF THE FUZZ

[beatupgrass]

Dammit, Kid.

Rocket drops his arms and rolls his eyes. "Yeah, yeah, I missed you two, you overgrown sapling. C'mere."

He's not a hugging person at all, but he knows he's going to embarrass the shit out of Groot if he hugs him in public, so that's what he's gonna do.

1.

[saltyadam]

[Adam had seen a lot of odd things in this place, so he isn't immediately shocked by the sight of yet another monster. He is a little surprised to hear it speak. In all the time he's been here they haven't done that.

Well, except for the ghosts. And this thing didn't look like a ghost.

With his wooden spoon gripped in one hand, Adam keeps his distance but decides to speak. Tentatively.]

I'm Adam. What do you want?

Re: 1.

[flora_colossus]

It has a weapon!!

Groot lifts his little fists and takes a defensive posture. It doesn't look particularly life-threatening, but it's better to not take any chances.

"I am Groot," he says quietly, keeping his voice as level as possible.

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?

2. Groot in the Streets in the town of Deerington

[oversight]

There's almost a collision.

"That's a weird place for a tree," Blake mutters to himself as he comes around a corner to spy Groot bent into a puddle. He had very nearly tripped over the bent young... root-man, distracted as he is by his own distant thoughts. It's been a rough month and with everything leaning towards the surreal, it's really not that much of a surprise, but... "Really weird," he adds, because he swears said tree just moved. And not in the rustling of the leaves kind of way. Also, it hadn't been there when he'd passed through earlier in the day.

Glancing around briefly, he leans forward a bit, voice lowering. Honestly, for what he's about to ask, if he's not right, he'd rather not be overheard.

"You're some kinda... sentient tree, aren't you?" It's not that wild of a guess, but again, if he's wrong, he's probably going to look like a lunatic...