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March 2020 Test Drive Meme

MARCH 2020 TEST DRIVE MEME

Welcome to March's Test Drive Meme! This month's Test Drive's theme is: SOULS & SINS.

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: Blood (both normal and black), B&W GIF with implied bloody hands, possible murder, possible body horror, possible insanity, possible suicide, possible forced aggression, possible demons, mental health references, leprechauns, stalking, being slowly eaten alive.
Don't forget to tag content whenever necessary. Have fun!

Prompt One
Prompt Two
Character Arrival
Master Navigation

GIVE IN TO THE BLACK BLOOD

Accidents happen. Maybe you scraped your knuckles against the lockers at school, or you got nicked in a sparring match, or your leg got caught on something in Rapture while you were away. Maybe you don't even remember how you got the small cut on your body, but it's superficial and nothing to worry about, right? Your tetanus shot is up to date (probably?) and even if it's not, it doesn't seem that bad.

You won't even notice the changes at first. The black blood is just like normal blood and you can't feel it as it invades your body, multiplying and taking over your regularly, healthy red blood cell count. It takes a day or two before your head starts to feel a little more chaotic than usual; thoughts start coming at racing speeds, becoming more and more violent as time passes. You can hear a voice that's not your own encouraging you, egging you on. telling you to just give in to the madness and embrace your destiny.

Under the effects of the black blood, you'll want to attack over the smallest things. Total strangers or casual friends will be the primary target as you seem to be able to at least recognize those close to you. You don't see these people as human, they're just a target, something to let out all those violent thoughts on. Even if you're weaponless, it won't matter; the blood in your veins can harden, burst from your skin and form its own weapon. Each one is unique to the person who is wielding it. Maybe it's a sword or two, a gun that is the perfect weight for you to hold, or a spear that's the exact length for the perfect throw. The weapons are indestructible and if they require ammo, they never run out. Those who are savvy enough will realize that they can harden the blood within their veins as well, usually in small concentrated areas, but it might be able to save you if someone gets the momentary upper hand and tries to strike a blow. While your skin can still be cut, any weapon will bounce right off of the black blood, and most blades might even crack if they don't have magical properties.

So how do you stop someone infected by the black blood? You'll have to get into their head. Looking into the eyes of someone under the effects of black blood will be difficult— their gaze is jumpy, staring at anything but the person they're attacking, and getting them to look at you long enough to enter into their soul will be a challenge because of it. If you manage to keep their head still, it only takes eye contact for three seconds before you'll be linked. You'll both end up in a small room, the one corner of their soul that hasn't been altered by the black blood.

The person under the effects of the black blood will feel weak, particularly if they've been trying to fight the effects of the madness taking over them. They'll feel defeated and might believe that fighting at this point is pointless. There's a small creature beside them, muttering to them these exact thoughts, that they're stronger this way, that it's the right thing to do.

The person who is trying to free someone from the black blood will have to target this ogre first. There are multiple ways to fight him, but the quickest is to find a way to shove him through the door you came in through and lock it. It'll give you a chance to talk alone, to try and encourage the other to keep going, to not give up, to take control. The ogre will be banging on the other side of the door the whole time, growing larger and louder with every passing second, so you'll have to do this quickly.

If the ogre ends up bursting back in or if you decide to attack right from the start, it can be killed— it's just hard to do alone. There's a glowing soul in the center of the ogre's chest, one you'll have to get a hold of and crush. Doing it by yourself is dangerous without weapons, but if you work together, it's not impossible. There is furniture throughout the small room you can use to attack with and if either of you are capable of summoning a weapon, you'll still be able to do so in this room. Magic will work so long as you're working as a team, but those trying to defeat the ogre alone will find their magic faulty and unpredictable.

Once you manage to pull the soul from the ogre, crush it in your hands, and the room will start to disintegrate. You'll end up back outside of the person's mind.

Purging the black blood from your body isn't pleasant; it will run from any open wounds and pour out of your mouth and eyes. It burns fiercely, evaporates as soon as it hits the ground, and sizzles like acid the entire time. When it's gone and your blood runs red again, you'll feel weak and disoriented. Maybe it's good to find someplace to lie down and recover for a while.

If you do not defeat the ogre or if someone fails to make eye contact with an infected person long enough to get into their soul, you will find the madness takes over all of your senses. The effects will last for two full weeks before you will collapse and the black blood will leave your body on its own accord. Death will also work to get rid of the black blood.

Note: Black blood can effect non-humans and those who don't even use blood. People who are usually incapable of getting cuts can still get infected with black blood as the wounds they enter through are supernaturally inflicted. The madness will affect non-humans the same way it affects humans and the weapons can be formed even if you don't have skin for it to come out of. You can still enter someone's soul even if they don't canonly possess one; it's the life essence that makes up any character. The black will pour out of whatever openings it can find when it leaves a body, regardless of if a character has a mouth or eyes.

WISHING YOU A RAINBOW OF HAPPINESS

Throughout early March, you will be able to find rainbows randomly scattered throughout the town of Deerington. They'll arc through the sky, overlapping one another, and each will end at different points throughout town. If you follow one and manage to find the spot where the rainbow meets the Earth, you'll find exactly what stories have always said you would; a pot of gold! Amazing! You're rich!

Only that would be too easy, wouldn't it? Deerington always comes with a catch.

If you find the pot of gold and take nothing from it, you'll find you're blessed with good luck and happiness for a full three days. Everything will go your way, people will be kind and friendly to you even if they are normally your sworn enemy. You'll find people do what you ask them to without even thinking twice about it. If you realize you have this power over people, you won't be able to order anyone to do anything against their will, and you won't be able to make anyone hurt themselves, but simple, innocent requests seem to work just fine. Want someone to feed you grapes? You got it. Need someone to fan you while it happens? Absolutely! Live like stereotypical royalty for a day.

If you take a small handful of gold but leave the rest, you'll find that your day is pretty average. Congrats. You just got yourself some gold free of cost.

If you take a large handful of gold, you will find your day goes pretty crummy. Everything goes wrong in the most expected of ways. You spill your coffee, your car breaks down, you're late for work, you mess up even the simplest of tasks, you step in a puddle that's way deeper than it looked and ruin your shoes. Everything sucks and no one is being very kind to you to make up for it. This will last for three days or until you return your handful of gold.

If you decide to take most of the gold in the pot, you'll be outright cursed. Things don't just go typically wrong, things will go terribly wrong. People around you will be put in danger, the ones you love will turn against you and might even start to attack you, accusing you of controlling their lives and being greedy and heartless. No one will try to kill you outright, but things happen when people are driven mad by your very presence. This will last for a week or until you return most of the gold.

If you take all of the gold, you'll get the same effects as taking most, but with an added bonus: people will definitely try to kill you. You'll also find that a small man seems to be nearby when ever any of these attacks happen. He'll start popping up everywhere, just watching you. He'll be at work, in the restaurants you frequent, on the streets you walk or drive down, and if you wake up in the middle of the night, you might even find him in the corner of your room. Just... watching. It's creepy, right? Each night it gets a little closer. If by the end of the week you haven't returned the pot of gold, the leprechaun will attack. It's hard to fight off, quick in its movements and difficult to strike. If it manages to knock you down, you'll have to hope someone comes along and saves you, as you'll be frozen in place. The leprechaun will slowly devour you, starting with your skin, and keeping you alive as long as possible through the process.

Guess you shoulda returned that pot of gold, huh?

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

[ After her two month sojourn to Places Even Shittier Than Deerington, once Gwen returns to Creepsville, she wants nothing more than to return to her normal ("""normal""") life. That means going back to work.

It's just as boring as ever, when someone new and interesting walks in. There's something familiar about the way she's dressed, but Gwen can't put a finger on it. ]

Uh. Hey! Morning! How can I help you?

[Rei looks around briefly, almost like she's hoping to see a specific someone. But, no such luck with Chloe. Darn.]

I...

[She turns to face the speaker with a distracted expression.]

Just looking for a friend. Does Chloe still work here?

[ Gwen brightens at Chloe's name, standing up a little straighter. ]

Oh, yeah! She does! She's, ah, not here right now. I think she's working at the high school right now, but if you want I can text her for you?

No, no, that's alright. I should still have her number if the devices work the same. I'll send her a message after school is out.

[Rei walks closer, leaning on the counter and setting her bow aside.]

My name is Rei. What's yours?

Gwen. Nice to meet you, Rei!

[ Gwen is bubbly and excited to meet someone new. Working at the shop alone all day can get boring. ]

So, how do you Chloe? Are you from the same world as her and Max?

[ Somehow she doubts it, going off of the attire and the longbow. ]

[Rei's head bobs in greeting, quick, informal...but friendly.]

I'm not. They're from a whole different Earth. And from an America at least ten years after my time, regardless.

[Settling into the rhythm of conversation is easy enough, Gwen seems personable even if her aura feels a little all over the place.]

I was stuck in this dream for almost nine months, and we met. I woke up, but apparently fell back asleep and I've returned. I don't know how long I've been gone, though.

Oh, huh...

[ Gwen knew that people disappeared from here. She's seen it happen before. With Miles, with Thor. But she didn't know people could come back. ]

When you say you woke up, do you mean back in your world, as though nothing had happened?

Correct.

[Rei nods in affirmation.]

I woke up, and now I'm back in the dream, apparently.

[ Gwen makes a "huh" noise. ]

Sucks to be you. [ RUDE. ] --I mean... Sorry you had to come back to this shithole.

It's fine. This place is dreadful.

[Rei makes a small noise, somewhere between a laugh and a sigh.]

But I made promises to help protect people here, and now I can continue them.

Yeah. That's basically what I've been trying to do.

[ Which... probably isn't obvious, with her standing behind the counter of a comic book shop, reading old back issues of Captain America. ]

I'm a superhero. Working here is just my day job.

[Rei arches an eyebrow at the statement, looking Gwen up and down.]

Is that so? What sort of talents do you have, then Gwen-chan?

[She isn't exactly skeptical...but...]

[ Huh... Why does Gwen suddenly feel like she's under a spotlight on a reality TV show with a mic in her face...? ]

I'm really good with swords. And guns. And I have reality warping superpowers, too, they just... don't work in this universe.

[ WOMP WOMP. Way to end on a down note... Gwen tries to salvage it with one last admission. ]

I also know a ton of stuff about other people's universes.

I...see.

[Rei's unable to keep the uncertainty out of her voice. Not because she doesn't believe Gwen about the powers, she just isn't really sure about that last bit.]

You're able to peer into different realities?

....Yes. That's a very distinct way of putting it.

[ She means 'succinct.' She's just dumb and doesn't know what words mean. ]

Succinct, you mean?

[So, Minako has made this exact same mistake with her more than once.]

Uh... Yeah. That's what I meant.

[ Great, making herself look bad in front of Chloe's friend. ]

[Rei, in fairness to Gwen, is used to that sort of tomfoolery with language.]

Is it something active? Or...do you have to be somewhere special? I have some extra-sensory abilities of my own. So, this is professional curiosity.

No, it's more of a passive thing. It doesn't work for everybody. Like, I'm pretty sure I don't know who you are. And I don't know anything about Chloe and Max's universe.

[ Because for some reason it never occurred to her writer that she may have played Life Is Strange so that's just what we're going with now. ]

But there are a bunch of people here whose whole backstories I do know. Sometimes I know their future, too.

I see.

[Some sense of tension, small though it may be, flows out of Rei. She doesn't know, or can't see, her secrets. Thank goodness.]

That sounds like something that could be tough to live with, honestly. I can only sometimes see glimpses of the future. You have my sympathy.

Yeah. It can be tough. When I first started back on the Earth I came here from, everybody thought I was crazy.

[ Because she went around telling people they were fictional. Thank goodness she doesn't do that anymore. ]

Mmm. Well, that I can certainly understand.

[It touches a little close to home. More than, if she's honest, but Rei's hardly ever honest with herself, even if her eyes dim a little.]

I'm sorry that happened to you, Gwen. You seem very sweet. Nobody should have to feel like that.

[ Gwen doesn't know how "sweet" she feels, but it's nice to have some sympathy for a change. ]

Thanks.

...Um. Is there anything I can help you with, until you find Chloe?

If Chloe's at the school, I shouldn't interrupt her till she's done.

[Unsurprisingly, academics is very important to her.]

Tell me about yourself? I feel like if you two are friends then we will be, too.

Ooh, yeah. Good point. [ Gwen glances at the clock on the wall. ] Not sure what time the high school lets out. Two? Three?

[ It's been years since she attended high school, and who knows if Deerington High follows the same schedule as her old New York public school. ]

I dunno if I'd say we're that close friends? We've chatted, we hang out here at work. We got each other Christmas presents..?

[ She feels echoes of her conversation with Eddie. When do you start counting someone as a friend? ]

But, uh. What do you want to know? I'm from New York City, originally, but I was living in Los Angeles before I got here.

MARCH 2020 TEST DRIVE MEME

GIVE IN TO THE BLACK BLOOD

WISHING YOU A RAINBOW OF HAPPINESS

Character Arrival

Comic book shop

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