DECEMBER 2019 TEST DRIVE MEME

Welcome to December's Test Drive Meme!

This month's Test Drive's theme is: PROPHETIC 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 death via exposure (freezing), Krampus imagery, possible vore, visual and auditory hallucinations, monster violence, stalking, decapitation

Don't forget to tag content whenever necessary. Have fun!

Prompt One Prompt Two Character Arrival Master Navigation

VANISH LIKE THE WARM STOVE

Winter has set in in Deerington and it’s as harsh as one would expect for the frigid mountains of inland Maine. There’s snow on the ground, icicles hanging off of most buildings, and black ice all over the roads. Better be careful where you step or you might just slip and hurt yourself while you’re walking around town!

But there’s something unusual about the cold. It feels bone-deep and no amount of layers or staying inside seems to make it shake. Your teeth are always chattering, you feel the need to hunch in on yourself to keep any heat from escaping, and if you look at your hands, you might see them go from bright red, to white, to even the slightest tint of blue throughout the day. You’re getting colder by the minute and it feels like there’s no way to stop it. Maybe you’re just doomed to freeze.

The box is waiting on a bench. You didn’t see who placed it, but there’s a small tag with your name on it, so clearly it was meant for you. If you ignore the box, it will start to show up on random surfaces around town wherever you might be; the kitchen counter, a desk or display case at your work, the floor of your bedroom… No matter where you are, the box is there too. Eventually, you might as well just give in and open it.

Inside every box are three matches. They’re relatively long, like the sort you’d use to light a fire in a fireplace, and they appear to be completely normal. People who can sense magic won’t get a reading off of the match and no amount of testing the wood or the tip will show anything other than the exact chemical make up one would expect. So maybe they’re safe! There’s a small note tucked inside the box with only two words written in childishly messy scroll; Keep Warm.

If you light the match, you’ll find that you’re instantly starting to feel a little less cold. It’s the first bit of heat you’ve managed to snag in so long that you’ll probably find yourself a little desperate to hold onto it. The matches burn at a relatively steady rate, not too fast or too slow, and the wind can easily blow them out, so be careful! You’ll have to protect the flame from the elements if you want to keep yourself toasty. The only strange thing that you might notice is that whenever you’re near another person who has a lit match, both the matches seem to burn a little stronger and stay lit a little longer. So maybe you’ll have to pair up and learn to share. If you’re smart, you’ll light just one of each of your matches at a time, giving you a total of six chances to keep yourself from freezing to death.

There’s always a catch though, isn’t there? Each match will come with a unique vision as the flame dies out. A vision that can be seen by both of you. The vision will belong to whoever’s match as burning and it will be as vibrant and detailed as if you were really in the middle of it.

The end of the first match will show you something you want. It can be anything; a warm meal, a new bed, an object from home you’ve longed for. You’ll be able to pick it up, taste it, smell it, do whatever you would normally do; but at the end of the day, it isn’t real, and ultimately you might find that you’re just chewing on your own (or your companion’s) hand.

The end of the second match will show a vision of someone that you miss. Whether it’s from home, a previous world, or someone who’s come and gone from Deerington, you’ll see them clear as day, calling for you and beckoning you to come with them. It’s probably best to not. After all, you’d have to leave your matches behind, and it’s cold out there.

The end of the third match will show you a vision of somewhere you miss. It’ll be like you’re standing in the middle of the very place you’ve been longing for ever since you arrived in Deerington — maybe even longer. It’ll look, sound, smell, and feel like the place you’ve missed most. It’s almost easy to want to stay and forget to come back to reality and light your next match.

If you both can make the six matches stretch until the sun sets, you’ll find that the cold has finally broken, and you’re able to keep yourself warm again. If you don’t? Well, it’s time to find someone else with a bundle of matches, and hope they’re okay with some basic invasion of privacy to stop you both from getting hypothermia.

BETTER WATCH OUT

Have you been a good person this year? Probably not! This is Deerington after all and everyone’s got a sin or two they’ve committed that they’ve been carrying around some deep shame about. Whether it’s something you’ve done here or something you did back home, the things your character feels guilt over will start to plague them more and more frequently as of late. Maybe you’ll start to see small little snippets of the memory flash before your eyes, or hear the voices of the people you’ve hurt calling out to you for mercy. No matter how it manifests, it’ll be gnawing at your insides, growing more and more impossible to ignore.

It might just be the paranoia from having to flashback to your worst memories at all hours of the day, but eventually you start to feel like someone (or something) is following you. You hear the scrape of nails against cement, the thud of heavy footsteps, or the sound of a heavy sigh by your ear accompanied with the smell of rancid breath. But every time you go to look, it seems like there isn’t anything there. No matter how logical a person you might be, you still end up feeling a little on edge, and you know you’re right about being… well, stalked. You may not be the sort who usually goes for comfort from others, but something inside of you tells you that maybe you’ll be a little safer if you aren’t alone. You seek out a friend, a colleague, or even a complete stranger— just someone who might make this creeping suspicion of being watched go away for a little while.

Except the moment that the two of you are together, Krampus finally arrives. He seems to fall from the sky, landing in front of you with a ground shaking thud, his long tongue hanging out of a mouth filled with razor sharp teeth. He’s ever bit the demon you’d expect him to be and he looks hungry. You can try to run or you can try to fight, but he’s quick and strong, certainly hard for any normal human to take down. And if you look into his eyes, then things are about to get a whole lot worse.

Whoever locks eyes with him will have the very thing you have been feeling guilt over put on display for both you and your companion to see. It’ll be like you’ve been transported directly into the memory, Krampus’ clawed hand gripping your shoulders and forcing you to watch whatever your shame is play out in front of you all over again. The detail is striking and there’s nothing left out, no matter how hard you or your companion try to stop it.

When the memory stops playing, Krampus will start to move his tongue around you, wrapping you in the long, blood red muscle like it’s a snake. You can try to break free and it’s possible to cut the demon’s tongue with a sharp blade if you or your companion happens to have one; whatever you do, it’s best to do it quickly before you end up a snack.

Krampus can be taken down in one of two ways; either the person who is experiencing the guilt must confess their sin out loud and profusely apologize, begging for forgiveness for their misdeeds or he can be taken down in a somewhat simple ceremony. The chains dangling from the Krampus wrists must be grabbed and somehow secured into the ground; this will weaken Krampus greatly and leave him more vulnerable to attack. Once he is secured, you must take off his head. It doesn’t matter if it’s cut off, ripped off or blown off, the moment the neck is severed from the rest of the body, the Krampus will turn a deep black, like coal, before crumbling into dust, leaving only the head behind.

A little messy, but definitely efficient.

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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Mm. No. I don't smoke, but feel free to ask someone in the bar.

[Magnus gestures to the portal, before stepping inside to the bar himself and he holds it open with his free hand still glowing from the flame.]

I don't have all day.

[Ian huffs at the comment about needing to move faster, not wanting to bite the hand that's clearly going to feed him, but not sure why this guy is acting like the one in a rush. He sits at the bar, more able to properly assess the situation now that he's not freezing.]

Yeah, I don't either, but if you want to go out back you have to let me warm up first. And buying me a drink doesn't count as payment.

[Faster because his magical energy was not what it used to be and he was still fine-tuning the calibration of what he could and couldn't do. Losing control of that would be unfortunate, especially at the tail end of everything he's already dealt with.

Magnus steps up to the bar and orders a cocktail for himself and made it clear with a throw of a hand in Ian's direction that whatever he had was on him too.]

Payment for what exactly? If you're insinuating what I think you're insinuating, I'm not interested. Consider it charity if you have to. I stopped hooking up with strangers outside of bars during winter storms during the Libertine era, and I certainly never paid them for it.

[It's clear from the look on Ian's face that he has to work his way to accepting that this guy actually did just pick him up in the park and take him to a bar without an ulterior motive. Or at least not a sexual one. He obviously isn't going to be lowering his guard though - he's cold and lost, not stupid.]

Oh.

[He orders a beer from the bartender and looks back to the stranger.]

Then why? You do a lot of charity?

Maybe find where you're going the next time you walk the streets. So, you don't wind up completely frozen to the bench you decided to take a break on.

I'll accept that as payment.

[The look he gives Ian at the comment about charity makes it clear he's not going around helping everyone out, but he does help where he can. How he can. Mostly because he knows the truth about death and what it can do here, and what Deerington was truly capable of. It's not something he'd wish on just anyone.]

You have no idea what's in store for you here. It's not just the cold.

[Ian drinks about half of his beer when it's handed to him and looks at the man dubiously.]

Didn't exactly have a map... but thanks. I guess.

[He almost doesn't want to ask.]

Okay. So what's in store?

There's not a map, this place is known to play tricks.

[It went without saying that it's tendency to play tricks was exactly what this newcomer had to worry about.]

Let's start with introductions first, I'm Magnus. I've been here a matter of months. Despite the cheerful winter snow, it's not a wonderland. Not out there. Regardless of the weather.

[Ian looks for a moment like he's considering not answering, but finally takes another sip of his beer and gives in.]

Ian - and I don't think I'd call this a wonderland.

[He pauses again, deciding how much he actually thinks this guy can answer.]

So by tricks... do you mean the matches? I know it sounds crazy, but I'm pretty sure they gave me like, visions or something.

[It wouldn't bother Magnus if he didn't answer, he's used to a certain sense of distrust, being a downworlder. It's just part of his life at this point, he does for others and then they expect more from him.]

It's not a wonderland, but then neither was where Alice found herself. The point is clear.

[This poor boy had never read Through the Looking Glass or spent actual time with the movie. Wonderland was full of tricks, deceit, and dismay. It wasn't a happy place, not in the slightest.]

I've heard the matches can cause some visual and auditory hallucinations. Given the atmosphere, you can see why that would be dangerous.

[Yeah, Ian doesn't really get the reference. He half shrugs.]

Sure. Whatever.

[He thinks back to the vision, shifting somewhat uncomfortably.]

So, it was an hallucination? It was weird. Like it knew what I wanted. How do you you fight off something like that?

More vivid than a hallucination but in essence, yes.

[Magnus can hardly imagine what would show up if he used the matches given to him. Of course, he didn't need them but curiosity being what it was still had him wondering. Maybe Alec, or his lair, something comforting from home that he hasn't seen in several months.]

You merely endure it.

[It's probably not the answer the guy wants but it's an honest one.]