Test Drive

[snowblindmods]

TEST DRIVE MEME

If you'd like to apply to Snowblind and would like to test the waters first or get a sample set up for your application, this meme is for you! We've even provided some prompts for you to use if you want (but feel free to make up your own). Here's how it works. ✭ Reply to this entry with a character you're considering apping into the game. You can include the name of your character and the fandom in your subject line. ✭ Comment around to others on the meme, whether you're in the game already or not. ✭ Now you have a sample ready for your application! ✭ So go reserve and apply when reservations and applications are open. ✭ Seriously, do it. Network Prompts ONE: IT'S THE INSIDE THAT COUNTS When you found the SD Card containing XRAY.EXE, you couldn't stop yourself from being a bit excited. This is definitely going to be something useful. Or so you think. It seems normal when you try it on yourself. You see all the bones in your hand underneath the skin. Pretty cool. But then you keep trying it on things to see if it can see through things other than living tissue. And, well, you didn't really need to see the pulsing organs and bone structure of the cabinets. Definitely not the beating heart inside of the matress you've been sleeping on. Maybe someone will be willing to take this SD card off of your hands. TWO: GROWING PAINS You woke up with a crick in your neck. You're sure, at first, that you just slept funny, but the ache hasn't gone away throughout the day. In fact, sometimes when you rub the skin in the offending area you're pretty sure you can feel a protrusion just beneath the skin. Maybe it's all in your head, but you think you'd feel just a little bit better if you could have a second opinion. If nothing else, maybe someone would be willing to share some kind of medication with you to ease the stiffness. For all you know, all you need is another night's sleep to clear it up. Still, surviving here is hard enough without having a potential spine-related complication hanging over you. Best to get the all clear as soon as possible. Whether or not there's anything actually there at all...well, you'll just have to wait and see what the Network consensus is. Confusingly, the response may be different from person to person. Action Prompts THREE: THE BONE ZONE The second the two of you stepped foot into this house you knew you weren't going to be comfortable staying in it for the night. Unfortunately, lockdown hits before you can think about backing out and trying to find another option. So what's the problem with this place? Everything is made of bones. The furniture, the decorations, even the walls and floor. It's the best you can do to hope that they're fake. Maybe this was a house belonging to Halloween enthusiasts? With luck, you'll still be able to find some useful items in the drawers. With even more luck, you'll still be able to get some sleep tonight. FOUR: SPOOKY SCARY SKELETON You almost done realize that something's after you and your traveling companion. It's not until the snow-covered skeleton is hot on your heels that you realize you need to run. The thing hangs low to the ground, gliding over the snow like it's nothing, silent and camouflaged. It's the clinking of the bones as they tap against one another that tips you off. That, and the piercing bloodshot eyes it has--real, human eyes when it shouldn't have any. Fortunately, your destination isn't too far in front of you. If you hurry and utilize some fast-thinking, the two of you should be able to make it in to safety. The real tricky part will be making sure that it doesn't follow you inside. That's where teamwork comes into play. Hopefully, the two of you are able to work together.

Comments

@LELRIC; audio

[armoured]

[The voice that responds is young, pre-pubescent, with a faint echo behind it. This whole thing hits a bit too close to home, he's had to deal with knowing that he somehow has veins as well now, so that the furniture does-- well... that's just horrific and has unpleasant connotations.]

...it's possible they were once people that were alive and something went wrong with the revival process?

@w.graham; audio

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

[ The youthful sound of that voice should probably worry Will more than it does, but for the moment he doesn't question it.

Instead he quirked an eyebrow and shrugged. ]

A reasonable possibility. [ He agreed. ] Revival processes usually don't go the way you expect.

[ Whether it was by trying to stuff mortal wounds with antler velvet or ... making people into furniture. ]

Haven't seen any brains. Have you seen any brains?

[armoured]

Uh, no.

[He sounds oddly calm about this; but then, he did just say he thought it might all be in his head and so perhaps he's just in denial.]

It might not even be there, it might just be something messing with our senses and making us think that the walls have blood in them to freak us out.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

If you are my subconscious then we both know that we don't require something messing with our senses to see blood on the walls.

[ Which did kind of support the theory that maybe, just maybe these voices weren't all in his head. ]

But for the sake of ... the sake, what would you say was messing with our senses?

[armoured]

[He shifts uncomfortable, which just translates to the quiet sound of metal clanking down the tablet speaker. That's a pretty personal revelation and he doesn't want this stranger to regret it when he realises the truth.]

I'm really not a part of your subconscious; my name is Al, Alphonse Elric, and I'm talking to you from the other end of this tablet. It's like a communication device-- um, a phone? Do you have those where you're from?

[This could be awkward.]

As for what's messing with us, it's probably a fault in the nanomachines. Have you tried to ask Eve yet?

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

[ If and when he sorted all this out, any embarrassment Will felt would center around upsetting a youth, rather than the expression of his own cracked sanity.

In fact, he laughed softly and answered in a tone that was almost kind. ]

Yes, we have smart phones and devices like the one in my hand, even if they're not something I spend a lot of time utilizing.

And I should point out that directing me to the Biblical figure of the first woman of creation does not really support your claim that you're not my subconscious.

[ Or in other words: who? ]

[armoured]

[He doesn't appreciate being laughed at, there's no reason this guy should think they're all in his head if he knows what a tablet is!]

She's not from any kind of bible, that's the name of the Admin who runs this town. Username of at Admin, she doesn't always answer, but sometimes she'll try and help out if we ask her what's going on.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

[ Sorry, Al. Sometimes the cracks in his mental foundations mean he slips into what is considered a lack of social skills. ]

So there is someone supposedly running this town and ... what? Torturing us?

[armoured]

...hasn't anybody told you what's happening here yet? How long have you been here?

[This really isn't good.]

The Admin is the one, yeah, who is pretty much running the town.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

I've got to be honest that I lost track of time, awhile back. So I'm not sure I can give you an accurate idea of how long I've been here.

Long enough to have wet feet, a sense that this is not my original location but not long enough to have died yet. Unless I'm already dead and this is Hell, which is still one of my working theories.

[ He pauses, sighs softly and rubs his eyes. ]

But this Admin, they help us and torture us at the same time?

[armoured]

I'm not entirely sure what they mean to do, whether the torture is all planned or just because the nanomachines really are unstable... we can't trust her entirely, but sometimes she'll give us some information.

[He really isn't sure on the Admin's intentions.]

But I don't think there really are veins in there, they're-- they're walls.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

Really? Is that what you think or what you hope?

[ He really should not be allowed to talk to children. ]

[armoured]

Can't it be both?

[He doesn't sound particularly phased.]

I've seen walls come apart before, I've seen people take apart furniture before today, and there wasn't blood or organs inside then. It's got to be a sensory failure.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

Or overload.

[ Neither possibility was particularly reassuring. ]

So is that what you believe this is? A glitch in the, what did that person call them ... nanomachines?

[armoured]

Right.

[A glitch, an overload, but definitely something nanomachine related.]

We'll know in a couple of days; usually when something goes wrong with the nanomachines we're either told about it, or it gets fixed, pretty quickly. A few days at most, we just have to hold out til then.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

Considerate tortures.

[ Wry comment is wry. ]

[armoured]

[Hardly, but he's not so dim as to miss that sarcasm.]

Trust me, there's worse that can happen here.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

You mean besides freezing to death, the risk of starvation, risk of madness, monsters that can kill you on contact and no foreseeable end in sight?

[armoured]

Hey, that's not true! We're going to find the way out of here, you can't let yourself believe otherwise or it makes the rest of this impossible to bear.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

[ Did he ...

Seriously?

Seriously?

Will sits there for a moment and then slowly shakes his head. ]

Yeah, alright. I'm willing to start believing that you just might not be a figment of my own psyche, because there is no way I have that much optimism left in my head.

[armoured]

That's a shame.

[He sounds genuinely sorry about it.]

Optimism, hope-- it's what keeps me strong. Even when things are the darkest and it seems like there's only pain, I know that if I keep moving forwards then eventually I'll find the light again.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

Sometimes there is beauty in the darkness, purpose to the pain. [ Will countered, before stopping and reminding himself that this guy sounded young and that maybe those weren't the sort of associations you should make towards the young. ]

But I expect people value the hope and effort you bring in all this.

[armoured]

[He doesn't exactly disagree that pain can serve no purpose, every experience of both good and bad times helps shape someone into who they are, but-- it shouldn't be something that's relished.]

You'd be surprised, a lot of people just get mad at me because I won't stop.

[ex_this_ismydesign36]

[ Will's lips twitched and he relented a little further. ]

Have a little faith, it's not really you they're mad at. It's their inability to emulate the example you set as a result of their internalized fear that's making them act out.

Most people want to be positive, especially when the night is at it's darkest and it frightens them when they find themselves slipping.

[armoured]

[There's the quiet sound of laughter from the other end, though it's not mocking at all.]

Maybe, I think it's just that I don't shut up. I just don't want people to forget the good things about being here, it's so easy to see them buried by the bad, and-- and well, it's easy to let them be buried too, it can be hard to see the good. That's why I think it's important that we do, otherwise it'll slip away from us.