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

[It takes a heartbeat for that to process for Shiro, too. I might be cured - it's been so long since he felt this much hope suddenly spark to life in his chest. And even longer since he saw that look on Lance's face.]

[Way too long for the latter.]

[That grin is contagious. And no sooner does Lance pump his fists than he's swept up into a hug again. Though, this time, he's getting hoisted onto Shiro's shoulders in the process.]

Then what are we waiting for!

[Lance yelps and goes stiff out of reflex when Shiro hoists him over his shoulder for an... airborne hug? He flails and his heart tries to escape his body for a panicked couple moments, but then he grips onto Shiro's shirt and swallows it down.

This should be a joyous thing, there was a time when this sort of sudden and boisterous affection was practically like air to him. Though his skin is no longer deadly, a lot of mental and emotional scars remain and he refuses to let them win right now.]

Y'know I'm used to getting a whole spin when my uncle does this. [He forces his voice to an aloof unimpressed drawl.] So far I'm not very impressed.

No?

[Honestly, he could skip, or hop, or dance or something, hearing that. For now, he'll keep Lance on his shoulders. Trying to angle his head enough to look up at him.]

You sure?

[He just - he's happy. Genuinely, deeply so. His hands on Lance's ankles squeeze once, in assurance. It's okay, he's got you, buddy.]

[Before, you know. Spinning in place with his teammate still sitting on him like a chair.]

[This is still a lot, but it seems to be making Shiro extremely happy and that's worth going along with it for a little longer. And underneath the kneejerk unease he feels, his inner child is getting a kick out of it too.

So when Shiro starts spinning in place, he pumps his fists up and hoots a victorious battle cry:] RAZZLE DAZZLE.

[Well that's unexpected. Enough to where it makes Shiro bark out a laugh. The speed of the spin increases. Hey, they're both trained on faster spinners than this. It's fine.]

I don't think they heard you up on the mountain!

[He's definitely endured spins and g-forces like a thousand times more intense, but his desire to stop that creeps up on him is purely emotional. He chuckles a bit uneasily and then taps Shiro's shoulder to signal to him as lightheartedly as possible.]

Alright, I think I've had my fill of the spinning Shiro express.

Pfff.

[It works. He slows the spin, though honestly? He wobbles a step or two at the end, still chuckling a little. But his grip on Lance doesn't waver - even if Shiro does - he's going to make sure there's no falling.]

Okay, okay. Hop down.

[He'll take a knee though, to make it easier.]

Sorry... I just - I guess I got carried away there.

[He doesn't hop so much as slide off and stumble back a couple steps. Then he steadies himself and crosses his arms over his chest.]

Hey, no problem. [He clears his throat and stamps down the anxiety that he might have made Shiro sick anyway and that he'd imagined his lack of draining skin.] Soooo, how long was I out?

[He's still assuming he got the veiny treatment rather than just full on left.]

[The elation on Shiro's face flickers and fades. How long - too long, in his opinion. But thinking back, it wasn't as long as others. He chews his lip, shrugging slightly.]

You weren't just out, Lance.

You were gone. Completely. [It's as gentle as he can make it. There's just no easy way to say those words.] We looked but -

Anyway. Little more than a month. I think. July got really hazy in the end.

[His eyebrows shoot up at that revelation.]

Well, that might explain why I didn't drain you. Like I got a soft reset or something. But wait, July?

[He rubs at his forehead, looking down at the ground in concentration.]

Last I remember it was like April? May?

July was... when your FLUID went offline. I think you were asleep for a while.

[Maybe more than a while, if Lance's memories are anything to go by. Unless Deerington decided to reset more than just - ]

Drain? You mean the ... you mean what Moira did?

No, I think I remember some flashes here and there from later... I think I asked Jesse to help me build a house??

[The expression on his face says he definitely has no idea what led to that and it sounds ridiculous out of context. But upon considering it a bit more, he thinks he knows why...]

Uh yeah. When I touched anything that has an energy source, I'd drain it. And it had some... consequences.

A house? Do you remember where?

[Maybe they can figure some more out, if they find it. Like how long it was there, or... more information at all.]

... Consequences?

No idea. It might just be some weird fever dream.

[He shrugs. Maybe he'll ask Jesse about it when he manages to catch up with him.]

Uh, yeah... radiation exposure to whatever... or whoever I touched. The really bad kind.

Let me know, if you find out? I'm curious to see it.

[And it'd be good to know where to look for his friend, if Lance ever holed up somewhere else again.]

... I remember now. [Maybe he'd made himself forget. Or shoved it down so far he didn't have to think about it again.] I kept the armor on after you told me.

Yeah, sure.

[Hopefully holing up somewhere else won't be something he does again... or soon, at least. Then he nods.]

It's also tied to my stupid feelings. I get too upset and start going supernova or something.

[He rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. That was his primary concern that made him insist on Shiro not being too close. He could handle not touching people, but the danger was sometimes just being near him too... it might still be, he needs to test it.]

[Your feelings aren't stupid]

[Is what he wants to say. What he almost actually says. It's absolutely a Shiro thing to say, and what any normal conversation would call for. But what part of this is normal?]

[He steps forward, though, to put a hand on Lance's shoulder. Decisively.]

Maybe we can try and fix it. Now that you're back.

[He crosses his arms protectively and awkwardly tries to figure out how he feels about that suggestion. It's a nice sentiment, but...]

I dunno. I kinda got into that mess in the first place because I wanted to fix.. something else. [He shrugs.] Maybe I should just count my blessings and be glad that the radioactive draining touch is gone.

...And hey, maybe all of it's gone and I just don't know it yet.

It's your call. [It comes out a lot more softly than originally intended. But the sincerity remains. His hands still on Lance's shoulders. It is his teammate's call. But more than anything... he wishes he could help. Wishes he could do something to make things easier on Lance.]

[On a good kid, who deserved better than he'd gotten, here.]

Just... know I'm willing to try anything, if you ever change your mind. Okay?