APRIL 2021 TEST DRIVE MEME

Welcome to April's Test Drive Meme!

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: Ghosts, talk of suicide, drowning, violence, zombie-like humans, blood
Don't forget to tag content whenever necessary. Have fun!

Prompt One
Prompt Two
Character Arrival
Master Navigation

THE LADY IN WHITE

Swamps are hardly pleasant place during the day, but at night, they’re even worse. The creeping fog, the full moon, the overall sense of dread... None of it makes you feel comfy cozy and ready to pitch up a tent for the evening. You want to get out of here quickly, but it’s hard to see too far in front of you and it’s easy to end up straying off the path. As if alligators and poisonous snakes weren’t enough to worry about, there’s a chill in the air that is strange for such a ridiculous hot evening.

I’ve been waiting for you...

The voice seems like it comes from all around you but you can’t see anyone near you. You can keep walking or try and search her out, but no matter which direction you go in, you can still hear her voice like she’s standing right behind you.

I’ve missed you. I loved you... She never loved you...

The voice becomes more distressed and you start to feel more of a pull to find her. As you wander through the fog, she’ll start to talk of a past as though it’s yours; a deep love you shared for one another, a romance that was denounced by her family, but you never failed to come to her. She will talk of how she begged her father to understand and begged him not to hurt you. But all the while, you were straying. Eventually, she found out she was pregnant, she tried to tell you, she wanted you to love her and your new family. She begged her father not to shoot you for what you’d done to her, and in the end? You ran off with the new woman who caught your eye. You left her alone. You left her unwed and an expectant mother. She begs you to do her one last favor, to come and meet her by your tree.

Eventually, in the distance, near a large willow tree, you see the image of a woman, shining brightly in the moonlight, her large, flowing dress as white as her skin. It seems like she’s floating over the ground, before you notice she’s not floating; she’s hanging. Her body swings in the breeze, the rope creaking, and finally an anguished, furious shout rings through the air:

I LOVED YOU!

The woman’s body disappears, but the rope stays behind. It turns out you weren’t the only one to explore this voice, looking for the desperate woman in the trees. Another person stands on the other side of the trunk, another Sleeper, someone you can hopefully team up with in this lost wood. You can discuss the grief stricken past of the woman you just heard or maybe together you can work together to get out of this swamp.

As soon as you leave the shadow of the tree, you’ll hear a woman again. Perhaps the same one? Only instead of words, she sobs incoherently. Maybe it’s someone who’s been hurt. Try to leave or go to explore. Either ultimately takes you to the same place...

A FINE NIGHT FOR IT

The lady in white—though perhaps a different one? How many are in this damn swamp?—is crying by the edge of the water. It’s hard to ignore and as you get closer, the crying grows louder. Maybe one of you gets close enough to reach out and touch her. Or maybe you call out to her when you’re in hearing range. No matter what, she eventually looks up to see you, and her face is covered in blood that runs from her eyes instead of tears. Her skin is sagging and wrinkled, rotted like that of a body that has been left too long in the water after drowning...

She lets out a scream before she rushes at you. Luckily, if you have a weapon, magic, or are particularly fast and strong, you can get the best of her easily. She’ll go down with one shot and her body will seem to disappear into the depths of the swampy water around you. There’s just one problem: she wasn’t alone. Her scream has clearly alerted others.

Strange looking people, their pale faces painted with mud and ground powder, come rushing from out of the trees. Their skin has a quality to it that doesn’t seem right, the same sort of rot that the woman had had, but they are definitely alive. And extremely strong, unlike your most recent foe. They carry all sorts of weapons, but they’re all ones you’d expect from people living in the woods: pitch forks, axes, machetes, hatchets... Anything that could stab you or chop you into pieces. They’re also clearly coming for blood. Some will try to tackle you to the ground and get a rope around your wrists and neck to tie you up into the trees and hang you. The Night Folk who roam these swamps want nothing more than to kill the intruders who have come into their territory.

They won’t speak. They grunt and shout at each other, but never say any actual words. The best way to kill them is to cut off their heads, but they’ll also go down if you beat them badly enough. Make sure to double check that they’re really dead though: it’s not uncommon for one to spring back up the moment your back is turned to try and kill you. Work together and maybe you’ll get out of this attack alive.

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

[Those words break his heart as Martin tries to curl just a little more around Jon. He wants to protect this man from everything about this horrible dream and the world to come that Elias dreams of. But just holding Jon in a swamp while an unknown, ghostly woman sobs probably isn't the best option.

Reluctantly, he loosens his grip, even if he doesn't let go. It makes sense to stick together right now.]

Thought you could find anything if you put your mind to it.

[He presses a kiss to Jon's forehead.]

What do you remember? How long's it been for you while you've been awake? It's been a few months here.

[Jon doesn't want to let go. He clings to Martin even harder. Damn the rest of the ruined world.]

I should be able to! And you were- I thought you were just behind me, but the fog- I couldn't see through it.

And awake? What? I- I don't understand. I don't sleep anymore, martin.

[Martin's brows start to furrow in confusion.]

You don't- what? [Martin runs his fingers through Jon's hair, savoring every moment of contact, even as the wails grow nearby from the grave companion in the swamp.] You can sleep here. You don't remember?

What? No Martin I- I've never been here. I assume it's some sort of domain but I can't-

It's not as easy as it should be to tell.

Domain?

[What? It dawns on him, the memories the jackalope had given him.]

Oh... Jon, this isn't- This is Deerington. [A pause.] Or... somewhere close to it. This is a dream, it's not the apocalypse. You were here before. We we've been here together for nearly a year.