Test Drive #16

[powersthatbe]

Welcome to the Synodiporia Test Drive Meme! Below the cuts there are two new prompts, and here are the prompts from previous test-drives, which you’re still welcome to use in this post. When you comment, be sure you specify what prompt you want to play with, and please put up your own threadstarter—it makes for a much more friendly environment that a forest of bare toplevels! OCs are especially welcome! Please take a quick look at our Directory & familiarize yourself with the concept and setting of the game before you jump in.

Our upcoming app round runs October 25th–November 1st, but for once we’re breaking with tradition and instead of an upcoming Jaunt, we have a special, upcoming, multi-week Liminal Space event called Welcome to the World Series, which heralds the end of Phase Two and the start of Phase Three of the game of Synodiporia. Having chosen their Champions in Phase Two, the mysterious entities known as the Trumps are divvying up the rest of the Travelers--and in Phase Three they’re playing for keeps.

Prompt #43 is set in an agricultural-themed liminal space—with a bit of fabrics and crafts thrown in.

Prompt #44 is set in the dreaming realm known as Questing Country. Here, with the aid of their Animal Companions, young lucid dreamers from a variety of species (crystalline Hecatites, long-lived Elves, aquatic Vodyanoi, bone-spurred and four-armed Spartoi, scaled Gorgons with their petrifying abilities and tentacled hair, and your bog-standard humans) fight together as Champions against the monsters that arise from the collective unconscious of their species… for now, anyway. At least until they grow up, burn out, or go wrong.

Prompt #43

Right now, Liminal Space is a patchwork of farmland--a literal patchwork, as the ground under the Travelers’ feet is printed fabric, sewn together as if it were a quilt. One patch has a field of lettuce, another a printed field of corn and so on and so forth. Just about every crop is represented in quilted form, including ones that aren’t exactly… standard. Or legal.

Crocheted farm animals roam atop the fields, making needle-clicking sounds whenever they open their mouths, beaks, and snouts. Here and there lie irons, face down, luckily not at all hot. If you climb on top of one, it should be possible to ride it around like a tractor.

As for the farmhouse, barn, and silo? Travelers might be able to see the plush shape of them on the horizon, but no matter how long they travel in that direction, they’ll never get any closer.


Prompt #44

Whether Fire Mushrooms from Nuclear Winter, Men-in-Black from Conspiracy Country, Plague Vectors from the Softened Caverns, Horned Masters from the Stealing Ships, or any of the manifold Nightmares that haunt Questing Country and cause it to summon its Champions, there is one thing all these enemies have in common: they arise from the fears and worries of their world.

Some of these Nightmares are seasonal.

It’s Exam Season again on Hecate, the annual time during its longer-than-Earth year when the young people of that planet take the tests that will determine both their future careers and their very right to be regarded as adults in Hecatite society--as well as the annual practice exams to ready them for it. To be young and Hecatite during Exam Season is to be in a very stressful situation, no matter your capabilities. So much is riding on the results.

So it’s really not surprising that the twenty-foot-tall Test Proctors from the Hallowed Halls of Education positively swarm from the time that the tests begin until the day the results are posted. The Proctors work to corner any young person they can find, essaying volley after volley of exam questions at them until they fail or give up or attack the Proctor--and that’s when the Proctors get nasty.

Comments

[theflyingone]

He allowed the man to assume he was trustworthy—regarding the freedom of Travelers, at least. In general, Assassins worked in deception. For him, talking to other Travelers was often an exercise in keeping secrets. Good thing he generally kept to himself and his books.

"...You are asking if the world is an illusion."

He felt, with a wave of nostalgia (and hurt, and hate) like he was back in the library at Masyaf, conversing with Al Mualim. He hid this as well as he was able, as he did with all things so personal. Without missing a beat, steadily holding Cal's eyes with his own, he asked,

"What is truth?"

[pionero]

He gave a shrug. "It seems like it would be."

If Abstergo had been otherworldly, this place made anything that the Templars had ever made look like a joke. The Animus had felt real. Sense, touch, feeling, sounds. All of it was there to make it feel as if the past was reality. This? This was something else. Everything told him that it was real. His mind, however, had a hard time grasping the fact that anything like where he found himself could be real.

The question pulled Cal's attention back to Altaïr. Maybe to someone else the question wouldn't seem so loaded or filled with the possibility of multiple answers. He wondered if there was an easier way to simply say that they were from the same Creed. One that wasn't riddled with secret words and phrases. Probably not.

"Nothing," Cal said simply. Then he raised his hand to gesture to the landscape around them. "What is permitted here?"

[theflyingone]

Usually, Assassins approached him and simple began talking about their missions. But then, he already knew their faces (when they weren't covered), and their missions were loaded with information only an Assassin would know. He had the benefit of growing up with a network. He had not expected so sure of an answer, nor a reference to the maxim. He felt both excited and apprehensive, but it did not show in his voice. He curled the fingers of his left hand away discreetly.

"Some Travelers will tell you that only what the Arcana permit is possible here. I say that we are only limited by what we choose to do or not do. Everything is permitted."

He studied Cal closely again and lowered his voice.

"You are," he counted, "eight centuries ahead of my time. Are you telling me that the Brotherhood still survives? And what of your finger?"

The removal of the left ring finger was required to use the Hidden Blade, though Altaïr knew he himself would eventually draw up plans for one that did not require losing it. Did the Codex, translated at the end of the fifteenth century by Leonardo, survive for another five centuries? Or did this man not yet complete his initiation?

[pionero]

There had been time spent in his room in Madrid thinking back over his childhood. Were there signs he could of seen that would of given the fact away his parents were in the Brotherhood? His mother's necklace had their known insignia, but he hadn't known it at the time. They moved from place to place and had odd jobs, making friendships hard to carry. He wondered how many of those people his parents knew were Assassins. The only fact his mind ever returned to was the blade that caught the morning light with blood dripping from it. The strange words that his father uttered in front of the TV - words that Aguilar would mutter to himself as well.

"It's all perception." Cal said, knowing the feeling of not having a choice in the matter, but realizing he always had the choice. Once again, the other Assassin's comments pulled him from his inner musings. "Eight centuries... what, you're from the 1200s?"

Then, he glanced around, as if to make sure no one was overhearing their exchange. It is not to ourselves but to the future we must give glory. A future purged of the Assassin's Creed. Those words were the ones that Rikkin had spoken just moments before Cal ran his blade across the man's neck.

"I've only met a few of them," Cal admitted. "But, there's enough of us that the Templars find us a threat."

His other question, however, brought a smirk to the older man's face. A flick of his wrist and his blade discreetly came from its hiding place. The blade was simpler and stripped to the bare minimum. A blade that could be attached and detached to avoid detection. His hand also still had the ring finger, as well as no mark. Cal knew only what he could recall of Aguilar's thoughts on the initiation. How it felt not having a finger while Cal knew he had his own. That might have been too much for an Assassin from eight hundred years ago.

Although he found himself wondering what to do now. The other Assassins he knew had been prisoners of Abstergo as well. He knew how to interact with people of similar circumstances, but, not someone like the Assassin in front of him. Even with Aguilar's presence in the back of his mind telling him that he could trust the man even older than him? Cal wasn't quite sure what to do.

"Callum," he offered his name. Hopefully it wouldn't be the wrong move to make.

[theflyingone]

"So the Templars remain, even carrying the same name... as do the Asasiyun from my time. By the Christian calendar, I was taken from my land in 1191. Several months and two New Years have passed since then."

He was referring to both the Christian and Muslim New Year, which had been within a month of each other this time around, but it was possible to mistake his words as meaning two years and change. Though he would not say it, both his Muslim and Christian birthdays had passed as well, unremarked upon like any other day. He'd made more of an effort on Eid, sharing a meal with Malik; and on the New Year, passing out food at a time when Liminal Space had been turned into an exhausting maze, as some Travelers could not find their way to those who regularly fed them.

A stranger unsheathing a blade in his presence made his shoulders tighten, but other than a flick of his eyes, he gave no other indication of unrest.

"Altaïr." Callum. English, or Latin perhaps? Nothing he hadn't already guessed. "There is a room where we may speak more privately." An Assassin should know why there is a preference for privacy.

[pionero]

"1191..." Cal repeated. Not out of disbelief but in almost awe. It had been amazing enough that Aguilar lived in the 1500s. He shook his head at himself, the black hood still firmly on his head.

At the flick of Altaïr's eyes, Cal retracted the blade. There wasn't a point in making more of a show than it was. The point was made - although he supposed it didn't need to be made to that degree. Any questions the Assassin in white had about the future could be answered in private. Which was why Cal nodded mutely to his suggestion. It was a conversation that prying ears shouldn't overhear. Just in case.

"Lead the way," he said in a tone of amusement. Just how far would this rabbit hole go? Instincts yelled and banged in his head that it was real and even his craziest fantasies could dream it up. Where would he have heard a name like Altaïr?

[theflyingone]

Cal was probably not a big astronomy buff. Just as well; Altaïr did not want to be made fun of, like they were children, for being named after a star. He could have been named just regular old Ahmed or Abdullah...

The Workshop was Leonardo's recreation of his own back home, complete with (fake) Italian sun streaming in through the windows. It had been expanded to house many books, several worktables, bedrooms, a dissection area behind a curtain, and another area with a seemingly nonsensical balcony, sparring dummies, and a haystack. The shelves of books seemed to hold tomes from many time periods and languages. They were well-organized, thanks to the efforts of Malik and Altaïr.

"Up here." There were spiral stairs leading to the studies.

[pionero]

Astronomy? No. Sailing? No. The criminal underworld, stealing from under the noses of big companies? That he could help with. As far as he knew, Altaïr was an old name that probably was as common as "Thomas."

Cal's eyes roamed around the Workshop. It was old, authentic, and probably something that Sophia Rikkin would have appreciated. A chill went down his spine at the thought. He sent a glance towards the Assassin before climbing the stairs. He hesitantly put his hand on the banister, almost afraid it would suddenly rot and disappear under his touch. Cal certainly wasn't the most delicate person.

Once in the studies, he reached up and lowered his hood. The blond-red hair was short cut. His eyes scanned the room in search for anything that might scream prison. Hidden cameras, mirrors that actually had people watching from the other side. Call him paranoid.

[theflyingone]

Cal certainly had reason to suspect hidden things, though not necessarily for the reason he was thinking. The room, other than being antiquated, looked fairly ordinary. However as Altaïr approached a particular shelf and pulled out one book—Il Principe, by Niccolò Machiavelli, tucked discreetly among the others—the entire bookshelf creaked open to reveal an alcove in the wall. There was a small notch in it.

He unsheathed his Hidden Blade and inserted it into the notch. A ceiling tile clicked and slid open, easy for someone of basic Assassin skill to reach.

"I would say, 'After you,' but telling someone I have just met to enter a strange ceiling room first seems... Anyway, follow me."

He replaced Machiavelli's book. He stepped up, climbed the wall, and leaped to catch the edge of the square-shaped hole. He hauled himself up into a domed room in Romanesque architectural style. Save for the round oculus, there were no windows. Arranged in a semicircle, framed by arches, and flanked by torches, were seven statues. Two of them, the one in Persian clothes and the one of himself, brandished Hidden Blades. He pointedly ignored the one of himself.

[pionero]

His attention swung over to the bookcase as it opened. Part of him shouldn't have been surprised, yet there he was, standing like an idiot being surprised. The surprise slowly turned into awe, almost like a child seeing a bigger world for the first time. In a way he really was. Cal looked from the hatch to the Assassin as he spoke. There was a small nod in response.

Cal followed the movements. Climb, then leap, catch, pulling himself up. His body knew the movements easily from his ancestral memories. Except he didn't have the training himself. Once inside the domed room, Cal's eyebrows rose. It was certainly impressive... and statues of Assassins? He didn't think they were the kind to make monuments to themselves.

"The Templars run a business named Abstergo." He decided it was finally a good place to answer Altaïr's statement. "It has a hand in everything. Entertainment, medical, probably even governments in some way or form. Food too. Any history book will tell you that the Templars were destroyed ages ago."

Which obviously they knew better.

wow i just remembered the motto was pretty much in Alan Rikkin's speech

[theflyingone]

He reached out with his foot and tapped the tile. It slid back into place, and a whirring below indicated the bookshelf must be back to its original position as well. He might not know exactly how Leonardo dreamed up the mechanism for this, but he'd seen how it could be worked. The rest of this room was built by an "eccentric" man, Ezio's great-great grandfather, according to Leonardo. Immortalizing Assassins in stone was definitely not the norm, and not just because of the lack of "idols" in the Muslim world. Altaïr, like many Assassins, preferred anonymity, though that had not stopped his future self from carefully inking an unlabeled illustration of Maria Thorpe in his Codex.

Altaïr had taken to using this room whenever he wanted privacy (until Malik had made him a room of his own), and also to store valuable things outside of his own Hammerspace (tucked behind his own statue). The Workshop had the advantage of never disappearing, despite the absence of its creator. The same could not be said of Malik's rooms, which disappeared whenever he Infiltrated or was in a Dungeon...

"'Erase'?" he asked, frowning. Then he frowned in a different way as he concentrated intently on disabling the autotranslate long enough to show that he was speaking Latin. "'Non nobis, Domine, non nobis, sed Nomini tuo da gloriam.' I see they have put on a different face, but not given up Latin. Those who have imprisoned us here are fond of Latin as well. Arcanum is Latin for 'secret.'"

the 100% debate begins if Cal knows anything of Latin (probs not)

[pionero]

The Latin was impressive, mainly because of how fluent it sounded coming from Altaïr. Cal just shrugged slightly. He presumed it meant the same thing that Rikkin spouted off in his speech. There had been a foster home or two where he did go to school, but finishing it was never on Cal's list of life accomplishments. Not that modern day schools taught Latin.

"All I know is that the royalty in Europe turned on them and killed them." Cal knew enough about bits and pieces. Names, dates, the people involved? Not so much. "Secret. They like to hide their faces behind fake windows and covering their faces?"

[theflyingone]

"They like to hide behind many things, and they have secret means of watching us. I am led to believe they could appear in this Liminal Space whenever they want. That is why I dislike speaking of the Brotherhood in open air here. I do not like to assume that these gods or spirits always inhabit the different bodies they take on, when they speak to us or try to blend in on a Jaunt—the lands we are taken to."

He should probably tell Cal about that.

"We do not languish here as in a prison, but are taken to other lands to do their bidding. Fortunately, the tasks they set to us are hidden, like a game, and as long as we remain in control of our minds, we do not have to do them. There may be punishments of course, but they allow for the possibility that we were simply unable to succeed."