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countryclub2022-12-25 08:15 pm
reddosmod) wrote in countryclub2022-12-25 08:15 pm
Entry tags:
DECEMBER TEST DRIVE MEME!
DECEMBER 2022 TDM
UNFORTUNATELY ALL TOO STANDARD ARRIVAL
THE MISDIRECTED
FROSTQUAKE
CODING
Another month, another test drive meme! Our test drive memes are open to anyone interested - regardless of whether or not you join our game!
All Test Drive Memes are game canon. Players can choose to keep their TDM threads canon or not. TDM threads can be used for AC and can be used as your writing sample for your application.
Our TDMs serve as a way to build into the actual lore and worldbuilding of Deer Country and we strongly encourage everyone to enjoy and participate! Current players are always welcome to pull prompts from the TDM to reference on the Network or bring into logs as well as tag out to new characters top-leveling on the TDM itself.
Characters will always be able to actively die during TDMs as this is an extremely dangerous world. You can still have this be game canon! Check out how character death in Deer Country works here.
If you have any questions about the TDM, please ask down below!
IMAGE DESCRIPTORS IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE
Prompt One
[Image One: Man in front of broken glacial ice]
[Image Two: Human face and shoulders, dripping blood with flaking skin]
Prompt Two
[Image One: Monstrous Human with sideways mouth and eyes]
[Image Two: Solitary Snowy Forest]
Prompt Three
[Image One: Frozen Zombie]
[Image Two: Icequake!]
All Test Drive Memes are game canon. Players can choose to keep their TDM threads canon or not. TDM threads can be used for AC and can be used as your writing sample for your application.
Our TDMs serve as a way to build into the actual lore and worldbuilding of Deer Country and we strongly encourage everyone to enjoy and participate! Current players are always welcome to pull prompts from the TDM to reference on the Network or bring into logs as well as tag out to new characters top-leveling on the TDM itself.
Characters will always be able to actively die during TDMs as this is an extremely dangerous world. You can still have this be game canon! Check out how character death in Deer Country works here.
If you have any questions about the TDM, please ask down below!
Prompt One
[Image One: Man in front of broken glacial ice]
[Image Two: Human face and shoulders, dripping blood with flaking skin]
Prompt Two
[Image One: Monstrous Human with sideways mouth and eyes]
[Image Two: Solitary Snowy Forest]
Prompt Three
[Image One: Frozen Zombie]
[Image Two: Icequake!]
WHEN: Last Week of November/First Week of December
WHERE: The Farther Shores
CONTENT WARNINGS: Body Horror, Frozen Wastes, Possible Transformations, Extreme Cold, weird offers of juice under suspicious circumstances?
WHERE: The Farther Shores
CONTENT WARNINGS: Body Horror, Frozen Wastes, Possible Transformations, Extreme Cold, weird offers of juice under suspicious circumstances?
The Heart of Winter in Trench is no time to enter the city as a sleeper. The entire beach is fully iced over with a glacially thick sheet of ice. Numerous patches of thick ice and heavy snowfall can be found around town, though they are shoveled to leave the paths accessible. Where the previous year, skates were rented and offered to those who wish to skate, the ice flows are far too craggy and irregular to be safe. Instead, cleats are given to those who greet and bring the sleepers to shore. Holes are bored at regular intervals deep into the ice flows and lights are lowered down into the holes to give guidance to sleepers' approach. When Sleepers rise from the depths, they find themselves in small wooden enclosures to protect from howling winds and bitter cold, able to form their bodies there in relative comfort in front of a censor with rocks heated by coldblood-infused stones especially for the purpose.
Outside of the bitter, and vicious cold, arrival to the city is a muted, quiet and otherwise uneventful occurrence. There are no tides of monsters. There are no horrific things waiting for people who arrive. There is simply a bone-chilling cold that numbs the soul a little. To help the people as they arrive, not only are they given their backpacks but they are also offered thick mugs of cocoa to help them cope with the cold. It seems to be helping quite a bit, actually. Yet, something about all of this seems off. The people of Trench are nervous, and there is an air of uncertainty in everything.
SEASONAL DETAILS ON THE BOARDWALK
Where normally there would be large food stalls set up and games, displays of beauty such as ice sculptures, the cold is bad enough that the people of Trench want not to be out as much as possible, and doubtless neither do the Sleepers. They are hustled and bundled from one small structure to another. Heavy winter furs that look reminiscent of great wolf pelts are given to everyone, especially those who have no clothing. But it is otherwise a strangely muted affair, though the people whisper of hope that the Shedding Ceremony is about to begin, and with it is the hope of new life and new birth in the City of Trench. In time, many will find that the symptoms associated with Madame Generosity's ceremony of shedding one's older self are in full swing throughout the month of January, complete with possible transformations and itchy, scaley skin conditions. Lovely.
Before every new sleeper leaves, however, a final gift is given. It is a small box, which contains a hand written note in scrawled black ink that is alarmingly similar to squid ink. This same box appears the morning of January 1st on the doorstep of every single home of a sleeper in Trench, without fail. If a person in Trench has strange accommodations, they nevertheless find this box where they would normally wake, or around a corner in the early morning with their name on it and no explanation. Inside the box are always the same items: 1 gallon of orange juice, 6 cans of chicken noodle soup, 4 boxes of tissues and what looks like an old world-war I era gas mask. The hand written note reads clearly 'DRINK THE JUICE!' Nobody in Trench seems to know why or who gave them.
Outside of the bitter, and vicious cold, arrival to the city is a muted, quiet and otherwise uneventful occurrence. There are no tides of monsters. There are no horrific things waiting for people who arrive. There is simply a bone-chilling cold that numbs the soul a little. To help the people as they arrive, not only are they given their backpacks but they are also offered thick mugs of cocoa to help them cope with the cold. It seems to be helping quite a bit, actually. Yet, something about all of this seems off. The people of Trench are nervous, and there is an air of uncertainty in everything.
Where normally there would be large food stalls set up and games, displays of beauty such as ice sculptures, the cold is bad enough that the people of Trench want not to be out as much as possible, and doubtless neither do the Sleepers. They are hustled and bundled from one small structure to another. Heavy winter furs that look reminiscent of great wolf pelts are given to everyone, especially those who have no clothing. But it is otherwise a strangely muted affair, though the people whisper of hope that the Shedding Ceremony is about to begin, and with it is the hope of new life and new birth in the City of Trench. In time, many will find that the symptoms associated with Madame Generosity's ceremony of shedding one's older self are in full swing throughout the month of January, complete with possible transformations and itchy, scaley skin conditions. Lovely.
Before every new sleeper leaves, however, a final gift is given. It is a small box, which contains a hand written note in scrawled black ink that is alarmingly similar to squid ink. This same box appears the morning of January 1st on the doorstep of every single home of a sleeper in Trench, without fail. If a person in Trench has strange accommodations, they nevertheless find this box where they would normally wake, or around a corner in the early morning with their name on it and no explanation. Inside the box are always the same items: 1 gallon of orange juice, 6 cans of chicken noodle soup, 4 boxes of tissues and what looks like an old world-war I era gas mask. The hand written note reads clearly 'DRINK THE JUICE!' Nobody in Trench seems to know why or who gave them.
WHEN: Last Week of December through End of January
WHERE: Outside of the Main Districts of Trench, the Wilderness
CONTENT WARNINGS: Horrifying Monster, Body Horror, Being Lost, Severe Disorientation, Hypothermia, Possible Death
WHERE: Outside of the Main Districts of Trench, the Wilderness
CONTENT WARNINGS: Horrifying Monster, Body Horror, Being Lost, Severe Disorientation, Hypothermia, Possible Death
There is no real warning about what comes. Somewhere in the last week of December, people just occasionally turn up missing. The numbers are never alarming, but they're greater than should have been expected in the month of January. Trenchies seem clueless to this, and the Hunters are left scratching their heads. They do not know what is causing the added disappearances, as none of the usual signs and warnings attend the recent uptick. This alone has them unsettled, and Trenchies begin to travel resolutely in pairs and trios everywhere that they go. The reason why becomes all too clear if one strays outside of Trench's main districts and wanders the roads between the districts or anywhere near the farms during this month and a half.
There is something out there. It can never be seen directly, but the sense that you are being watched is inescapable. Hints of a figure in the shadows of the trees are nothing new in Trench, but there is a definite air of malevolence to it, one that is obvious and pointed at your person the moment that you recognize that it is present and acknowledge its existence in any fashion or form. The creature is never there if you look directly at it, but if you happen to catch it more closely out of the corner of your eye, the horrifyingly twisted form of a human being whose eyes and mouth are turned sideways is barely visible, pointing at you!
This would be the time that many good hunters would attack, yet the creature is a slippery one. It never actually attacks directly and any time a person tries to turn to it, it is simply gone. Indirect attacks can cause it to flee, but it always comes back at some point, seemingly invulnerable to attack. What it does, rather than attack, is far more nefarious as its mere presence can be disorienting to anyone who encounters it. All sense of direction becomes lost, and the person can find themselves wandering further and further out into the wilderness, even if they were originally within sight of their destination. The more lost they become, the more that their mind descends into a fugue, one where concentration becomes worse and worse, and memory seems to slip away until they lose all sense of identity. The further out, the colder it gets, and the more the smell of rotten eggs lingers, fetid in the air.
The spirit is eventually identified by some of the Arcane Scholars as not being native to Trench, and they believe it is from somewhere much further in the north, from places far removed from this town. There are only snippets about one of their kind ever being encountered in Trench before, and the reports said it eventually became lost and left again, as will this spirit. It is indestructible and unkillable, as it is already dead. The only true defense is to, when the smell of rotten eggs comes along, to cover the mouth and nose completely. The burning of incense also helps, anything to block out the foul odor, which turns out to be the likely vector of its disorienting effect. If they happen to have a compass that unerringly shows direction from prior events, those too can be a protection of sorts finding their way back. If one travels too long out in the wilderness, though, there are fears that one might become as lost as the spirit and die in the wilderness, ultimately sharing the fate that brought it into existence. Even those who escape the spirit's wrath may have lingering memory issues, though those should pass over the next week.
There is something out there. It can never be seen directly, but the sense that you are being watched is inescapable. Hints of a figure in the shadows of the trees are nothing new in Trench, but there is a definite air of malevolence to it, one that is obvious and pointed at your person the moment that you recognize that it is present and acknowledge its existence in any fashion or form. The creature is never there if you look directly at it, but if you happen to catch it more closely out of the corner of your eye, the horrifyingly twisted form of a human being whose eyes and mouth are turned sideways is barely visible, pointing at you!
This would be the time that many good hunters would attack, yet the creature is a slippery one. It never actually attacks directly and any time a person tries to turn to it, it is simply gone. Indirect attacks can cause it to flee, but it always comes back at some point, seemingly invulnerable to attack. What it does, rather than attack, is far more nefarious as its mere presence can be disorienting to anyone who encounters it. All sense of direction becomes lost, and the person can find themselves wandering further and further out into the wilderness, even if they were originally within sight of their destination. The more lost they become, the more that their mind descends into a fugue, one where concentration becomes worse and worse, and memory seems to slip away until they lose all sense of identity. The further out, the colder it gets, and the more the smell of rotten eggs lingers, fetid in the air.
The spirit is eventually identified by some of the Arcane Scholars as not being native to Trench, and they believe it is from somewhere much further in the north, from places far removed from this town. There are only snippets about one of their kind ever being encountered in Trench before, and the reports said it eventually became lost and left again, as will this spirit. It is indestructible and unkillable, as it is already dead. The only true defense is to, when the smell of rotten eggs comes along, to cover the mouth and nose completely. The burning of incense also helps, anything to block out the foul odor, which turns out to be the likely vector of its disorienting effect. If they happen to have a compass that unerringly shows direction from prior events, those too can be a protection of sorts finding their way back. If one travels too long out in the wilderness, though, there are fears that one might become as lost as the spirit and die in the wilderness, ultimately sharing the fate that brought it into existence. Even those who escape the spirit's wrath may have lingering memory issues, though those should pass over the next week.
WHEN: First week of January
WHERE: Anywhere around Trench
CONTENT WARNINGS: Natural Disaster Horror, Frostquakes, Falling Peril, Sinkholes, Fear of the Dark, Frozen Zombies!
WHERE: Anywhere around Trench
CONTENT WARNINGS: Natural Disaster Horror, Frostquakes, Falling Peril, Sinkholes, Fear of the Dark, Frozen Zombies!
At first you think you're being treated to something spectacular! There's a small scale aurora that shows itself in the sky over your head. It's breathtaking and quite stunning to behold. The truth of the matter is all too real almost immediately afterwards however. There is a dull, booming crack as the frozen ground underneath your feet breaks and shudders, giving way! It's an earthquake, or more accurately a frostquake. In and around the city of Trench, as the temperatures shift in the dead of the cold of the Bone Moon, ice flows and patches of snow shift and compress against the ground, causing localized earthquakes to occur.
These frostquakes can damage buildings, causing items to fall, breaking plaster and the like. They are not, however, strong enough to do permanent harm to the buildings unless they are themselves structurally unsound. Each of them is localized, their experience not traveling more than two city blocks way each time one strikes. However, if you are unfortunate enough to be outside when it happens, they have an alarming habit of striking under the feet of unwary sleepers. Every time one of these frostquakes occurs, a patch of ground opens up temporarily into a deep sinkhole!
Falling into the hole can be an unpleasant sequence of events, but the ground beneath is littered with snow and something soft. Though banged up, the sleeper should be able to survive the fall intact. It's getting back out that is the problem. The walls aren't sheer, but it's a difficult climb. A rope can be thrown down, but it's very dark and cold in the space, making it hard to see much of anything. The real danger lies in the fact that they find that they are not alone! The 'softness' that they landed upon turns out to be a small number of other unfortunate souls who once fell in a prior frostquake, their bodies freezing to death long ago and rising as undead, waiting for an opening to escape. They attack blindly and though they can be defeated, they are still quite strong. Unlike some zombies, they do not hunger for flesh, but for the escape from their icy tomb and will do anything to crawl their way out, where they can wreck havoc finally on the living! Better deal with them quickly!
These frostquakes can damage buildings, causing items to fall, breaking plaster and the like. They are not, however, strong enough to do permanent harm to the buildings unless they are themselves structurally unsound. Each of them is localized, their experience not traveling more than two city blocks way each time one strikes. However, if you are unfortunate enough to be outside when it happens, they have an alarming habit of striking under the feet of unwary sleepers. Every time one of these frostquakes occurs, a patch of ground opens up temporarily into a deep sinkhole!
Falling into the hole can be an unpleasant sequence of events, but the ground beneath is littered with snow and something soft. Though banged up, the sleeper should be able to survive the fall intact. It's getting back out that is the problem. The walls aren't sheer, but it's a difficult climb. A rope can be thrown down, but it's very dark and cold in the space, making it hard to see much of anything. The real danger lies in the fact that they find that they are not alone! The 'softness' that they landed upon turns out to be a small number of other unfortunate souls who once fell in a prior frostquake, their bodies freezing to death long ago and rising as undead, waiting for an opening to escape. They attack blindly and though they can be defeated, they are still quite strong. Unlike some zombies, they do not hunger for flesh, but for the escape from their icy tomb and will do anything to crawl their way out, where they can wreck havoc finally on the living! Better deal with them quickly!
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The drones take a standard small swarm position, relative to the spider instead of the people. This close to Murderbot, their feeds front and center, they don't immediately respond on their own. Murderbot sends them a signal, and they project a thumbs up in response. Not a telepathic response, but a response.
"I have one omen," Murderbot says, "it's a swarm of drones." Yes it understands the irony in the statement. So it goes to one of the tried and true explanations it has come to rely on.
"It looks like a swarm of drones I worked with back where I'm from," Murderbot adds, "Not a lot of animals live in space." Now it's stuck on a low tech planet, but at least its 'soul' remembers things like where it's from.
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"I'm not sure I see how that works," Chrollo says, but he's willing to put it aside from the moment. Asking more seems invasive. "But if it's not something to worry about, at least that's good. Does it like to wander around and ask if people are doing alright?"
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"Usually only people I know," Murderbot faces the person. In its internal feed, connected to the drones, it imitates ART to loom. Except it's stupid because it cannot loom at itself. It's like the face thing. The drones giving it away.
"I'm working right now though," Murderbot says, "Finding people who aren't okay and sending them to The Entertainment Feed to relax."
It sighs because it's heard so many apologies in response to that statement.
"No, you're not wasting my time even though you're okay," Murderbot says dryly, clearly with the tone of someone who's said it a lot of times, "Everyone gets corrupted sometime. If you find it relaxing to read a book, listen to music, watch movies or serials, or play games, or if you know anyone who does, you're welcome to come in. You don't even have to be corrupted. It's for fun. Just... have fun for a while."
Preferably without talking to Murderbot, but it has resigned itself to the fate of regular conversation with people. That's more tolerable when it's about media.
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"That does sound relaxing," Chrollo admits. He usually has a book or two with him to read to pass the time, and card games are a common among the Phantom Troupe whenever there's time to spare.
Just have fun for a while to avoid becoming corrupted and turn into a monster. It's a concept that could fit into an episode of Power Cleaners or one of its many spin off series. And now he's curious enough that he'll go there sooner rather than later. It's almost too convenient, but that would be like being suspicious of someone out promoting a public library because the happened to hand him a pamphlet.
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"Everything at The Feed is accessible on your omni," Murderbot says, " physical copies stay in The Feed. We also have a movie theater, private rooms, regular events."
It waves a hand. "I can give you a full rundown if you want, or if there's anything you're interested in, ask away," Murderbot says. It could have a recording of itself by this point.
"Number one rule is no violence," Murderbot adds, "Given people come back from the dead here, there's people who've killed each other walking around Trench and having to deal with that. You want to duke it out? Go ahead. Outside."
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"Is there a stage, too?" It's more of an idle curiosity he sees no point to avoid than any real interest. The whole world is Chrollo's stage now, even if his intended audience is absent from Trench.
No violence is a rule Chrollo doesn't mind. Rules are useful, even the Troupe has a few, and no physical fighting among members is one of theirs as well.
no subject
"I haven't finished restoring the small auditorium," Murderbot says, "No one's asked, and Trench gets... weird. It keeps me busy. Would you use it? I'll work fixing it into the schedule if it'll get used."
"Want to use" and "will use" aren't the same thing. Still, it directed a pathfinder, with the assistance of a few drones, start sanitizing the space.
no subject
Chrollo's spider omen starts to move forward as if it intends to approach the other Sleeper, and he's quick to draw its attention back to him by touching one of the back legs.
no subject
"There are also recordings of plays," Murderbot says, "Most of them are from Earth, but some plays about Preservation—that's where I was living before"—but not where it was because ART had gotten it kidnapped by an alien-remnant infected hivemind before an actual alien kidnapped it and brought it here, a kidnapping from a kidnapping, kidnapception you might say—"washed up with me."
It neglects to share that they were saved to its hard memory inside it. He doesn't need to know that.
no subject
"Plays set in space, are they fiction or based on real events?" Chrollo can't deny being genuinely curious about what plays about people living in space would look like when they were made by people actually living in space. It's almost more interesting than the strange split omen.
no subject
"There's a mix," Murderbot says, "The founding of Preservation is popular and overrepresented. They always include Captain Consuela Makeba's speech AKA 'we are not leaving a single living thing to die.' I'd think they'd have run out of ways to do it by now, but no, someone always comes up with another."
It mostly sounds bored with it, which is true, because there weren't any SecUnits on the planet. No one had to stretch that definition too far.
no subject
"Not leaving a single living thing to die sounds like quite a task," Chrollo says. He doesn't add that he's skeptical, because he's all too familiar with how easily people will find excuses to think of someone as less than or an exception.
no subject
It waits a full second to add further explanation because the new person doesn't seem to be from space himself. "Corporations seed small colonies on lifeless planets all the time. Most of the time if they're lost or abandoned, everyone dies. Preservation's a happy"—naive—"exception."
no subject
"I'm glad your home managed to pull through."
no subject
"Thanks. There's a small alliance of similar places," Murderbot says, "More than most people in the Corporate Rim know about." It shrugs. That's not in the corporations' interests.
"No corporations here," Murderbot says, "It's a barter system. Or, at The Entertainment Feed, donations and volunteers. Officially I'm a Nightwalker since it helps lower corruption. I'm allowed to charge what I want, but it helps everyone." It shrugs. More than anything, it doesn't want to feel like a part of the Corporation Rim's way of operating, even though it previously felt like Preservation's free for everyone thing was super weird. What would Ratthi say if he heard?
no subject
"Do I need to take on some kind of official title here?" He probably won't even if he 'has to', Chrollo hasn't cared much for the rules of societies in a long time.
no subject
The face it's making probably makes it easy to guess how often Murderbot's used that resource.
"You don't have to. There's no official role for many near universal professions," Murderbot says, "If you want to do work that relates to the main official ones, then it'll help you to. You can get patches or markings on your clothes, access to related businesses, and easier access to potential customers.
"For healing, blood minister. That'll take training since that's a new/different system here. Instead of traditional blood type markers, it's your Sleeper blood type. For fighting beasts, which you know were animals or people once, hunter. For study/understanding the world, arcane scholar. Entertainment and emotional support, nightwalker. For people who grow or make stuff, really it's weird to me that farmers and engineers and artists are the same category, architect. I didn't make these rules. For worship, disciple. That's the same whether it's Pthumerians or a god from where you're from.
"Then there's everyone else."
It might be in the brochure, but the brochure doesn't seem to recognize how weird this whole place is.
no subject
"I'll have to think about it, then," Chrollo says. He should have the skills to get whatever he needs on his own, and the idea of having customers and running a business is almost laughable. But it might be simpler and less time consuming to do that to support himself depending on how difficult it is to get supplies through other means.
Trading away his blood seems unwise. It would be dangerous if everyone had nen, and it's even more dangerous without knowing what blood magic or abilities people have brought with them.
no subject
"People find all kinds of ways to live," Murderbot says without judgment. "When I first got here, there was a rumor someone was living in the sewer. Don't know why they would. Any unoccupied housing here is free real estate. You clean it up and live in it, it's yours."
It shrugs. That's how it got The Entertainment Feed. A lot of fixing up.
no subject
The way housing works sounds more and more like home, as well. Except the rudimentary sewage system never would've been habitable.
no subject
It shrugs. "I didn't care to figure that one out. I don't think the objects that come here like us end up in the sewer. Thankfully," Murderbot says. That'd be the only reason it would go—media.
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"It could be worse, it could be us swimming into the sewers instead of up through the ice." Chrollo's watching for a reaction, both in the other sleeper's aura and their expression.
no subject
It's face makes an expression similar to people about to throw up. Fortunately, it does not throw up. Five points to lacking a digestive system. Nothing else changes. There's no threat being made. Besides, the point serves as a reminder that Murderbot's arrival was far from friendly.
"It was worse," Murderbot says, "when I arrived there were giant monsters in the water. It takes time to remember yourself. First time I came to, I was at the bottom of the ocean. I escaped some... thing, but I drowned before I reached the surface. I didn't even know who I was as I was dying." Talk about a bad time to convert to a lung system.
It shakes its head. "Sewer's gross, but it wouldn't have killed as many people. One tried to eat someone on the beach right in front of me." Tried because Murderbot shot that tentacle off, and the thing decided to search for easier prey. That day Murderbot decided it didn't want anything to do with violence in this dumb place. As much as it's had a choice in that.
no subject
"Sounds like I was lucky to only have to deal with a little ice."
The thought of dying doesn't bother Chrollo much, particularly when he knows he'll come back. Drowning isn't a terrible death all things considered, there are many that are far worse than that.
"What kind of giant monsters in the water?"
no subject
"Take every horror monster trope you know, combine it with every image of sea life you've ever known, turn the size up until you and I are tiny little specks, and make them narrowly focused on killing any and every Sleeper they can get their body parts on," Murderbot says.
It references its personal archives while it explains. It pulls out it's omni and makes a show of opening the files and asking the drones to display some of them. They project two of them into the air beside them.
"Like that."
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