SEPTEMBER 2020 TEST DRIVE MEME

Welcome to September's Test Drive Meme! This month's Test Drive's theme is: CHILDREN/YOUNG ADULT 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: Evil dollhouses, potential body horror (turning into a doll), heights, pranks with the potential to cause harm, some stalking vibes
Don't forget to tag content whenever necessary. Have fun!

Prompt One
Prompt Two
Character Arrival
Master Navigation

THE EVIL DOLLHOUSE

When you wake up, you find you're not in your own bed, your own room, or even your own house. The room is well decorated, almost Victorian in fashion. The bed is pretty uncomfortable and you're not even sure the mattress is a real mattress. The chairs look like they might be made of plastic and the doors are flimsy. But it might not be what catches your eye, especially if you look out the window.

Through the clear panes (which also seem to be plastic), you will notice you do not see the town of Deerington, or even the outdoors at all. You see a living room that feels larger than life. There aren't any people in it, but as you look around at the fake looking furnishings and the strange view, you might be hit with a realization: you're inside a dollhouse.

The dollhouse has three floors for those who explore; the second floor you woke up on has two bedrooms and a fake little bathroom, all decorated in the same Victorian dollhouse style as the room you originally found yourself in. The bottom floor has a cute little kitchen with small porcelain dolls sitting around the table, a living room with all the basic furniture one would expect to find (in fact, it looks a great deal like the living room outside the windows), and an office filled with books that can't actually be pulled out of the shelves. On the very top floor is an attic. It's dusty and filled with broken toy beds and chairs, a few shattered doll pieces, and on the far wall you'll see another bookshelf. All seems... fairly standard, really, if you're used to seeing dollhouses.

But what there doesn't appear to be is an exit.

While searching, you may run into another Sleeper. A friend or a stranger, it's clear you're both stuck here together. And the longer the time ticks by, the more concerning things get. You might not notice at first, but anyone inside the dollhouse starts slowly... changing. It seems to go at a different pace for everyone, but the results are always the same. Your skin will start to become porcelain, your cheeks more rosy, your clothes made of cheaper cloth material, your joints become stiffer, and your eyes will start to become more and more glass like. If you don't get out of the dollhouse soon, it's clear that you may become the next doll at the kitchen table.

Searching the house again may feel fruitless, but keen observers may find light scratches on the floor in front of the bookshelf in the attic. Maybe they were like that because of someone moving things around or maybe there's a reason. If you decide to eventually pull the bookshelf aside, there will be a large door in the wall. It may seem strange, given that the wall only leads to the outside, but it's the only door to the outside that actually opens. You expect it to open up into the living room, but instead you'll see the grass of the park below. Far below. It's likely you could get hurt jumping, especially if you've started to turn to porcelain, but what other choice do you have?

Once characters take the plunge, they will find that they land rather softly in the grass, despite how high the jump may have seemed. As soon as you are out of the dollhouse, your body will have returned to complete normal.

And the house with the dollhouse in the living room will be nowhere in sight.

THOSE PESKY KIDS

You start off thinking maybe you're just forgetful and moved minor pieces around in your house without paying attention. You might think you're just seeing strange things out of the corner of your eye, because why wouldn't you? It's Deerington. Things are always strange. But each day, there's something weirder going on. Small objects might turn into entire rooms being rearranged, strange sightings out of the corner of your eye might turn into you swearing you saw a lake monster running through the street, and you swear you can hear the rattling of chains or the sounds of someone telling you to leave echoing in your house at night or following you down the street.

A haunting seems plausible. It wouldn't be the first time in Deerington. But no amount of herbs burned, or exorcisms performed, or chants and spell cast will make these things go away. In fact, they seem to just becoming more and more frequent, and more and more intense. Eventually, the strange creatures you see running around may start to try and attack you. They may start to try and kill you. But they always run off before you can attack back or show yourself to be stronger than them. It's probably the first time the monsters have ever been so easily scared.

Anyone who looks into it further may start to find weird clues lying around after a monster has been chased off. Footprints that don't look quite monster-like, tapes or records that when played will make strange rattling sounds like the chains you've been hearing, a piece of rubber that looks a lot like the monsters skin... Huh. The more you follow the clues, the more they'll lead you towards the answer to your dilemmas; these aren't hauntings.

They're pranks.

People can work together to catch a monster or ghost (or killing it, if you decide to); catching them will lead to them getting quite flustered and angry, struggling to get away. Pull off the mask or the sheet and underneath you'll find... a very disgruntled townsperson. Maybe your business was taking too much money away from theirs and they were hoping you'd close down with enough scares, maybe you talked back to them one time and they were looking for revenge, maybe you ruined their house or garden when you were fighting the things in Deerington that actually try to kill you, or maybe they were just having some "harmless" fun; they all have a different excuse, but they're clearly angry about getting caught.

They woulda gotten away with it if it weren't for you pesky Sleepers, after all.

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

[ By now, the joints in Gerard’s body have turned to small porcelain spheres. What used to be tattoos of eyes poked into the skin now appear small, delicate and painted. Gerard moves stiffly, but luckily, he can still move.

He stares at the other man for a long time, his expression intensely focused. It’s a strange way to approach someone, but it’s not judgmental. It just seems like Gerard is trying to figure something out.

Eventually, Gerard takes the hand, and joins the other man up on the edge. He looks down. They’re awfully high up. ]

They’re not always that different. [ Gerard looks at the stranger again, like he’s waiting for some bit of information to click. ]

What do you know about death?

[ his glance drifts over gerard's skull, then drift down his body, but.. he doesn't really seem to be looking at him. just.. looking, maybe. finally, they fix on one of the painted eyes, then rise again, meeting the other man's. ]

I know that it's the most precious commodity in the world. [ the ability to die, to end pain and suffering, to go into oblivion.

of course, it's a thing to be feared, as well.

his glance drops away, a shadow of anxiety in the small curve of his mouth. after a moment, he gently presses the porcelain fingers his are still curled around. ] My name is Oliver Banks. I belong to the End.

[ Strange -- that's what Gerard half-expected this man to say about freedom. He totally agrees, though. As a man who never got the chance, Gerard knows how precious it is to die properly. ]

It is.

[ The End. That makes sense. Gerard's expression softens, now that he isn't trying to figure Oliver out. Gerard doesn't drop his hand -- he's not especially afraid of the End, not when it's already taken him. ]

I'm Gerard Keay. I think you noticed I'm already dead? [ He saw Oliver glance at his skull, after all. ] But my death was -- incomplete, I guess. [ Gerard shrugs. ] Guess I could die again. You'd know better than I.

Yes, [ he says faintly, and reaches, touching fingertips to the other man's head, where the withered knot of vines is thickest. there's something odd about them, though-- like gerard said, incomplete. half-done. he doesn't want to look any closer-- it's not especially his business in this world that isn't ruled by the eye.

he blinks once, and his hand drops away again, glance finally finding the other man's once more. it feels strange to be known like this, not by the archive and the eye, but by someone who is very nearly perfectly human. known and--more importantly--not feared. ] You could, because all things can and will. But I don't see it yet. If.. that's a comfort.

[ his free hand moves, fingers twitching, lifting again, this time to touch one of the painted eyes. ] This feels like the Beholding.

[ Gerard tilts his head, lets the other man touch. He isn’t sure what Oliver is looking for exactly, but he can guess. Oliver is surprisingly gentle and that strikes Gerard as unusual, more than anything else. ]

It is. [ a comfort, Gerard means. ] I like being here. You might too, if you stay long enough.

[ Gerard’s gaze follows Oliver’s free hand. He nods agreeably. ]

They are. When my skin’s actual skin, these are tattoos. I marked myself for Beholding, when I was younger.

[ Better Beholding than Mary Keay. Still, he tries to serve it as little as possible. He’d rather use that awful knowledge to do some good, rather than sit back and drink it all up. Gerard is grateful he still can. ]

[ something a little distressed crosses his expression, his brows drawing together. .. will he be able to stay? he never wanted to be what he is, he tried so hard for so long to be better, but it had been for nothing in the end. here, though.. here, he almost feels like oliver banks again, the man he'd been before the end of the world. ]

Maybe, [ he says at last, soft and uncertain.

his fingers move across the painted eye he's touching, then fall away, curling instead loosely against his outer thigh. ] I'm sorry. [ that he was marked at all, perhaps, or that it happened when he was young. that he'd died. that he'd had little chance to live before this. that something terrible and ugly had been done to him.

he glances away, toward the fall, and his fingers tighten gently around gerard's. ] Should we go?

[ At the uncertainty, the distressed expression: ]

I don’t see any reason why you can’t. There are other avatars here, and other dead people. This place doesn’t seem to care about that.

[ Gerard doesn’t quite know what to say to Oliver’s apology, and mentally files it as “unusual,” like his touch. But it’s good, Gerard thinks. It’s also good.

Gerard’s own hand returns the squeeze, and he nods once at Oliver before looking back out at the drop. It’s a long way down, but if Oliver says it won’t kill them, then Gerard figures he has nothing to fear. Besides, it’ll be nice to introduce this kind new man to Deerington proper.

Not letting go of Oliver’s hand, Gerard slides off the ledge. The distance turns out to be short, the landing soft. As soon as Gerard’s feet make contact with the grass, his joints turn back to flesh and blood, warmth rushing back into his hands and all down his body. He looks over to Oliver, and smiles. ]

Looks like we made it. [ and now that they’re free: ] You hungry?

[ his hand slides away from gerard's once they're free of the dollhouse and flesh and blood once more, but he doesn't draw any further away. it's not often he's near people these days, except to feed his patron-- and he'll be feeding his patron until no soul is left on the planet. until jonah magnus's ugly world falls, until there's nothing left but oliver, and then only terminus, and then nothing.

he misses human company. he misses feeling alive, he thinks, although he's not sure he remembers what it was like.

he glances up, stilling at the smile. even before the apocalypse, people hadn't smiled at him much. he's eerie on his best days, terrifying on his worst. but gerard isn't like other people, either. ] .. Yes, [ he says at last, and his own mouth twitches upward in a slight return smile. ] At least, I could stand a cup of tea, I think.