APRIL 2020 TEST DRIVE MEME

Welcome to April's Test Drive Meme! This month's Test Drive's theme is: ENCHANTMENT 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: Enchanted food, possible body horror, mild finger injuries, magic based mind control, rapid aging, possible death
Don't forget to tag content whenever necessary. Have fun!

Prompt One
Prompt Two
Character Arrival
Master Navigation

YOU UNCULTURED SWINE

Pork is on sale!! Time to buy it up for all your family meals. It also means anything with pork in it in all of the restaurants is on special and super affordable for just about anyone. New arrivals can even get a free meal of bacon, sausage and eggs at the diner! Seeing all the low prices, you find yourself craving pork more than ever. But who doesn't love bacon, right? Maybe you had ham and pineapple pizza at Peter's or those delicious and mouthwatering pork dumplings at the Hot Pot. You could have cooked a nice pork loin with your friends and family for a large get together. Candied bacon is a real treat to munch on in the park!

You're cooking it yourself or getting it from the local restaurants, so nothing bad could happen with a little self-indulgence, right? Just about everyone has learned not to trust the food at a giant feast in Deerington, but short of the lunch and dinner menus at the diner, the restaurants and the grocery store have never done a Sleeper harm! At least, that's the way it's always been before. Two years is long enough to start taking things for granted.

Anyone who has any of the specials from the restaurants or who cooks any kind of pork related product at home will find that once they have finished their meal, they will slowly turn into... pigs. It seems to vary on how fast a single person turns, some moving slowly over the course of days while they eat more and more food, and others will turn into a full blown pig in a manner of minutes. At first you can still talk to others and display your usual personality in pig form, but the longer you stay a pig, the more boarish you'll become.

So how do you break the curse? Locals say there's a magic stream up on the mountain that will stop these kinds of enchantments, but you can't go alone. Someone will have to carry you up and sing to you while you drink. It might be a friend or a lover or a complete stranger, but whoever you can nudge into it will have to physically carry you in their arms up the side of the mountain looking for this stream. It can take a while— the walk is fairly long, a few hours at best, but you'll know it when you find it. The stream sparkles unnaturally in the sunlight and it seems like none of the animals are willing to drink from it's unnaturally cold waters. The moment you take a long sip while your companion sings whatever song pops into their head, you'll turn back into a human. Hopefully your clothes turn back with you.

If your character does not eat meat/pork, then they'll be safe from this event!

GOOD ENDURES

Mirror mirror on the wall...

The pork doesn't seem to be the only enchanted object around Deerington this month. There are several of them cropping up all over the place and each one has a different outcome for those unfortunate enough to run into them.

Spinning wheels seem to be in the most random of places. Some of them will even just appear in your house. Sometimes multiple spinning wheels show up. Anyone who gets to close will have the strong urge to prick their finger on the spindle, the needle very easily cutting the tip and making you bleed more than you might have expected. Hopefully you have a first aid kit around.

Anyone who pricks their finger will find that they are forced to follow the next person they see around everywhere. They'll follow them to work, to school, to the bathroom, to the kitchen, even to bed. It doesn't matter if it's someone you've never spoken to in your life, you will follow them like a lost duckling every hour of every day. It's enough to drive anyone bonkers.

Mirrors will also suddenly be being displayed in every home and every shop, even if you never had them before. It doesn't matter whether or not you have a reflection, any person who looks into the mirror will find that they are forced to imitate the next person they make eye contact with. This can be their personality, their posture, the way they speak, their basic movements— you'll start to become a total mirror image. If it goes on too long, you might even start to find the two of you start to look more and more alike...

Apples start to pop up in all the stores as well as in your fridges. They're bright red and look so delicious, you can't resist taking a bite. Even if you don't like apples or are normally allergic to them, you'll want to eat these, and you'll find they taste delicious and don't bring harm to anyone. At least... not at first.

A few hours after eating the apple, you'll start to notice differences in your appearance. Your hair has start to thin and become gray and limp, your skin is wrinkled and covered in spots, your hands become frail and shaky. You're aging, and rapidly at that. Before you know it, you've turned into a hideous hag, one that would frighten children in any fairy tale book. But how do you reverse it?

The cure for all three enchantments is to tell three facts about yourself. Even just introducing yourself will show improvement if it's to someone who never knew your name before. Those who ate the apples will have to seek someone out, but anyone who pricked their finger or looked in a mirror will specifically have to confess these three facts to the person they're enchanted to follow/imitate. Once three facts have been shared, you'll be able to leave, return to normal, and age back to your regular self.

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

As they made it into town, Molly twisted her hands together, thinking about what Airy had said. She hadn't felt like believing anyone in the first couple of days, but she'd certainly heard similar stories. It made her wonder if there weren't some truth to it, especially considering the consistency, not to mention how all of them had woken up.

"Sodder's a familiar name," she revealed. She plumbed the depths of her mind, trying to recall where she's heard it before. A crime? No, a tragedy. "There was a story. A family who lost five children. Don't think they ever found the bodies, but they were supposed to have been killed in a fire." She remembered there was something else in the original story that had bothered her, details in particular, like a missing ladder and a mysterious drifter, not to mention the lack of bodies as evidence.

Molly looked suitably disturbed, adding, "I sure hope they're not one in the same..."

Ariadne shuddered involuntarily at the mention of a fire. Molly couldn't know, of course. No one actually knew, apart from Aunt Lysia, Uncle Tahafra, and Princess Amanda. Not just because Ariadne was secretive. She didn't like to think about the fire. She didn't like to think about everything she had lost that night.

It lived in a very small, very dark corner of her brain.

Still...

"A fire is such a mortal way to go... You'd think that would make this local god something like all of us. We live. We die. We suffer loss."

"I guess so," Molly responded, although she didn't really know what she was agreeing to. In her mind, if there was a god involved here (or God) then the greater implications would have suggested to her they were all dead. And since she didn't want to think at all about that, she just agreed with Airy and sort of shuffled the conversation right along. "You know, I'm sure they're not one in the same, the Sodders. Just a weird coincidence, probably.

"Anyway, here we are," she noted now that they were back in town. "I was just thinking of heading to the store, seeing what I could scare up for dinner." In it there was an unspoken offer, wherein Molly would be glad to have company, but wouldn't want to put anyone out if they already had plans. Airy, after all, seemed like a very nice lady, like someone Molly would like to get to know.

Ariadne frowned a little bit, looking genuinely confused. "Why do you need to scare your meal?" she asked, completely innocent and sincere. Unfortunately. "Are you a hunter? Do you enjoy the thrill of the chase?"

Not unheard of. Although Elves were strict vegetarians, Ariadne had spent plenty of time among Humans, including animal hunters.

...some of them really seemed to enjoy it.

Oh, what a sweet girl. Molly found herself instantly that much more endeared to Airy, her hand pressing to her chest at the precious query. She nodded, then, grinning. "A hunter of sorts. I'm a deputy with the Bemidji Sheriff's department. But that's—" Molly giggled. "That's not exactly what I was meaning. I just meant that colloquially speaking.

"So, what do you say? I don't mind making you a meal, and I know all kinds of things to make on account of my dad running a diner." Not that she was tossing that out there as boast, it just happened to be a fact that she didn't mind leaning on. And she certainly didn't mind a little company, either.

Colloquially speaking. Well, that explained it. Ariadne was absolutely terrible with colloquialisms.

She still wasn't entirely clear on this one. But she nodded her head anyway. She wanted to go with Molly.

Almost felt like she needed to.

"I'm not picky," she said.

Molly smiled appreciatively, nodding. She could already tell that Airy was sweet and kind and she liked that about her instantly. There weren't enough kind people in the world as far as Molly was concerned. And if she could help nurture that, she would. Starting with a good, home cooked meal. All it would take is a short trip to the store, a little discussion between the two of them, and some time in front of the stove.

Of course, with Molly quick to invite Airy, it would be hard to tell the young lady was compelled to follow.