synodiporia_ooc | Test Drive #16

Entry tags:

test drive

Test Drive #16

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.

Threaded | Flat

Prompt 44

When the Proctors find their young victims, when their questioning becomes too much, when the confrontations turn to violence...there is still hope on the horizon for the young dreamers.

Hope that comes in the form of a dark-haired woman in leather armour, summersaulting through the air as she lets out a piercing battle cry.

"Ayiyiyiyiyiyiyi!"

Then she lands, feet planting on the ground in front of the Proctor, their victim safely behind her. "Like testing people, do you?" she asks, a wild grin on her face. Then she draws her sword, and the grin disappears into an unimpressed scowl. "Well, why don't you try testing me."

Prompt 43: Guenhwyvar is a cat

Guenhwyvar is enjoying herself. Although rare during his many years on the surface, Drizzt has once or twice known smaller house cats to play with toys made of fabric. She may be a 600 pound astral panther, but it seems she shares some interests with her far smaller cousins.

Not that she's attempting to hurt them. Hardly that! Guenhwyvar is off playing with a small herd of plush cows, about five or six, and takes turns with chasing each other. Drizzt could keep up if he had wished, but this seemed something that is best left to the animals, stuffed and flesh. He finds a good hill to lay back on, cowl pulled low to shield his eyes, and joins his hands behind his head with a sigh. Nothing like a plush hill to take a nap on after a rather "hectic" first Jaunt.

It's nice to be back in his own body once more.

Prompt #44: When Drizzt's Player Realizes He's a "Young Person" and won't Waste the Opportunity

Drizzt doesn't know what to do. All of his decades of experience have left him without the tools to deal with a situation like this. He's helpless, and he feels helpless, and there is not a thing Guenhwyvar can do to help him, try as she may.

A huge form spews question after question at him, now that he's been cornered at the end of a hall, "A drawer contains 4 yellow markers and 6 red markers. What is the probability that you select two yellow markers if you reach in the drawer and randomly grab two markers without replacement?"

"I don't--" Drizzt protests, for perhaps the millionth time.

"A) 1/24, B) 1/5, C) 1/12, D) 2/15, E) 1/10!"

"What is the point of--"

"Answer!"

Drizzt tries his best to ignore the growling from Guenhwyvar. "C?"

"No!" The form looms closer.

Drizzt just stares up at it, not sure what to do; what can he do? He's not being outright attacked, and the large creature is just spewing random questions at him. There's no reason to fight it, as threatened as Drizzt feels at the moment. Drizzt is skilled against giants, and hopes he can take this one down if it indeed does attack him, what with the way it is getting increasingly angry at Drizzt's failures. He never learned about questions like this in Melee-Magthere, and even the wizarding school would have not covered such problems. He holds his arms out helplessly wide, not really sure what to do with this at all. It had taken him a few moments to even realize that the letters signified different options to the questions when he was first cornered, and now the stream of questions are neverending.

"D?"

"After the first term, each term in a sequence is p times the preceeding term and q is the first term of the sequence. If the ratio of the sixth term to the third term is 8, what is a possible value of p ?!" Drizzt doesn't interrupt this time, only giving the large creature a stare that seems to go through it. "A) 0, B) 1, C) 2, D) 3, E) q!"

"C?" Drizzt reiterates his answer to the last question in desperation.

"T-Bone earns b dollars per hour--"

Drizzt takes one look at Guenhwyvar, nods firmly to her, and then make a break for it, slipping between the proctor's legs with Guenhwyvar only a step behind. As the roar of protest begins, Guenhwyvar takes the front, trying to lead Drizzt to safety. Enough of this nonsense!

43

Nanako is easy to find in this Liminal Space - either because she is currently riding a large iron around the farm, pretending to harvest invisible crops, or because she has somehow managed to surround herself with crocheted sheep and cows, petting them while feeding them scraps of cloth she's pulled from the surrounding area. They seem to like it, and the Trumps don't seem to be getting mad...

She does, however, get a little irritated when one of the yarn creatures tries to eat her dress. "H-hey! Stop that!"

44

Though there are terrifying things about - this is Questing Country, after all, the land of dreams and nightmares - one particularly young person doesn't seem to be at all upset with her situation. In fact she is remarkably pleased, bouncing from floating stepping stone to floating stepping stone as a miniature platypus worriedly trails behind her. "Ch-Champion of Justice... wait!"

Nanako giggles and waves a mirror-wand in front of her, which plays a sharp metallic sound from its handle at the press of a button. To anyone who knows her world, that sound - and the song the young girl is humming along with it - is eerily familiar. Anyone who watches TV much will recognize it from the series Magical Detective Loveline - and when they see her dressed up in the uniform of the titular protagonist, they'd understand why she's humming it.

"Watashi wa Misu Raburīn, dō ka... Go On Watching!"

She twirls with a flourish as she steps onto the other side. The platypus behind her seems relieved when she is standing on solid... er... "ground", which looks more like a sturdy bubble filled with glitter at the moment. The platypus is undeterred from its quest, though, doing its best to scurry up her back to rest on her shoulder.

"I still need to come up with a name for you, don't I?" She asks the platypus, gently patting its head before making a few thinking sounds. "What about... Kamono-kun? Does that sound all right?" The platypus chirrs contentedly, and Nanako giggles happily before setting herself down in the grass. "I can't wait to introduce you to onī-chan, Kamono-kun!"

I bet you thought no one would like being the center of attention amidst a million questions.

I bet you thought anyone would be throwing a fit or attempting to escape or kill someone.

You would think.

Well. Not Jarlaxle. Not at all Jarlaxle. If there was any person on the face of the planet that loved being the center of attention and given the chance to listen to his own voice for hours at a time, it is Jarlaxle.

He has so far outlasted at least three Proctor's and it seems like he's more than willing and ready to out talk every single last one of them too, having propped himself comfortably against a wall with his sword not in hand, but close in case he needed it.

... Half these answers are bullshit anyway.

Prompt #43

[Amanda's a city kid. She's spent the vast majority of her life within sight of the Los Angeles skyline - unless it's too smoggy to see that far, or raining, of course - and although she knows in theory that agriculture is important, it's not something she has any particular familiarity with.

Except for certain possibly-bullshit concepts from pop culture, but hey, possibly-bullshit has never particularly slowed her down before. She just needs an accomplice - one that isn't invisible, intangible, and currently complaining in a voice only she can hear that there's nothing remotely interesting going on... ah. That person looks promising.]

Hey. You. Yeah, you with the face. Come on, we're going cow tipping.

Prompt #44

Amanda has never tested particularly well, and she'd thought that once she was done with highschool she'd be done with this shit indefinitely. But no, apparently a diploma from an LA public high school is not actually sufficient qualification to convince the Proctors that this scrawny nineteen-year-old is a bonafide adult.

Actually, the "verbal questions with a side of mortal danger" format might be better than the usual form of American standardized testing, just in terms of keeping her focus, but she's pretty sure that if she ever took the classes that half of these questions apply to, she wasn't paying attention. And also Roadrash keeps offering totally unhelpful suggestions for any question that involves moving vehicles. She's mostly managed to keep her head above water with quick thinking and informed guesses, but eventually she messes up - "None of the above?" on a question where it very much was one of the above - and dives out of the way of the enraged Proctor's lunge, gasping out a string of not particularly creative profanity in two languages. Apparently swearing isn't the correct answer, either. It doesn't slow the Proctor down any, at least.

She's really regretting not learning the Shroud or practicing the Caul to a degree that would give her any useful combat abilities right now - she's pretty sure that going cold enough to fool thermal imaging isn't going to do any good. Keep dodging and hope someone else notices shit is going down it is, then.

Prompt 43

This is stupid. Fabric fields are stupid. Crochet animals are stupid. A farmhouse and barn that refuse to get any closer no matter how long you walk are extremely stupid. On the whole, Ankh is extremely annoyed and very much wanting to climb up somewhere high so he can sulk, glare, and keep a wary eye out for anything hazardous and/or stupider. But the only thing worth climbing is one of those irons. And shortly after he attempts it, he manages to set the thing in motion, gliding swiftly and steadily across first a field of quilted cabbage, and then rows of corn and beans...

"Damn it! Hey!" And his efforts to figure out how to stop the thing aren't amounting to much. "...You! Get out of the way!" It is a warning to someone that's in the iron's path, but it's hardly a friendly one. That's just not his thing. Frankly, they should be glad they're getting warned at all.

Prompt 44

Traipsing through a magical dreamscape was probably preferable to being dead, but it wasn't enough to bring a smile to Kaito's face. The yellow monkey trailing after him and insisting that he was the 'Adversary of Strength' was annoying. And suspicious. And as he wandered through fields that became city streets that became academy halls, it seemed to him that something about his powers felt... off. It was enough to make anyone scowl, certainly.

He is a little surprised when he comes across a twenty-foot tall looming creature shouting word problems. But he is not impressed that it is aggressively shouting word problems at someone that seems terrified and unable to answer. "You!" He shouts and strides forward, coat flapping dramatically. "Is that all you've got in you?"

And though he reaches for his driver, his hand hesitates, that 'off' feeling asserting itself again. He could transform, or change his form, or... something else entirely, apparently. Well, let's see what the giant proctor decides to do, first. Or its victim.

[43]

Animals were her thing, yes. But she wasn't used to animals that, by all intents and purposes, shouldn't be walking. Magic was also her thing, but then no one ever taught her how to magic a plushie.

But the little girl can be found in various fields, either playing with crocheted dogs, trying to ride on plush horses....

Oooor tearing apart a stuffed sheep with her teeth.

That's fine.

That's normal.

[44]

"NO."

That seemed to be the constant answer from Aisling, hands full of rocks and sticks as she pelted her attackers from wherever she could, scampering away between their legs, tantruming and throwing things at anyone who got to too close-

A proctor literally lost a finger in her sharp toothed snapping maw, the feral fairy trying to scramble up a tree like a distressed squirrel.

"GO AWAY! YOU'RE DUMB AND SO ARE YOUR QUESTIONS! I'LL EAT YOU ALL UP, YOU BETTER LEAVE ME ALONE!"

44 - Investigating

"I can wait all day, you know." The Adversary of Waiting is just standing with her arms crossed.

"I know all of the answers to all of the questions that you can pose. It's not like there's anything else to do in a damn tower." The proctor fumbles around, throwing out more questions that Fiona answers easily, yawning a bit.

A tiny green ogre stands by her feet, cackling up a storm. This is getting good.

43

The world should not be so ... soft.
Jinana's been told about the situation, but it is still hard for her to deal with the idea.
But ... it could be worse. After all, it already has been.

She knows the things are harmless. As harmless as everything else here - how can that even be? They're just fabric ... constructs. Nothing more. (The fact they don't register as something more is a little disconcerting in its way.) But when there's a squad of ... the word 'sheep' comes to mind briefly ... making their way over? She watches them warily with a frown. What are they up to...?

44 [infiltrator]

The Oracle of Blood's never really understood the Hecatite outlook on life. Proving yourself, fine, but surely there are better ways to do that than pieces of paper? (Better ways to do it than her own people's, too, true, but ... that'll be relevant to the situation when it's Spartoi nightmares causing trouble.)

Still, regardless, she has a duty. She's searching for any young, troubled Champions she can find to ... interfere with the questioning. Even if she doesn't know a lot of the answers herself.

"Timbuktu."

"That was incorrect the first time, the fifth time and now, and always will be!"

Seemed like a proctor was having issues. This gross, dinged up and sharp looking metal creature had refused to leave the entity alone, interrupting every time the nightmare tried to corner a champion.

With the same. Damn. Answer.

The shit eating grin was obvious as the being turned to snarl at him, the automaton digging a gnarled finger into the old and rusting wound in his face.

"Says who? Maybe I like Timbuktu. Whaddya got against the Timbuktuians, asshole?"

44 - investigating

No talking animals have come anywhere near Shinji, and that's fine by him. (Except for where it isn't, not really, but like hell he's gonna admit that any time soon.) The bigger problem, as far as he can tell from a few minutes' observation, is that the talking animals are the ones who explain how... whatever this bullshit is works.

Whatever. Not the first time he's had to learn by doing, and it probably won't be the last. The giant exam proctors aren't going out of their way to corner him, either, which at least gives him a good opening to observe.

If he didn't know better he'd say he was still in the damn hospital, having some kind of weird-ass coma dream or something. But whatever is going on, it's clear pretty quickly that the giant exam proctors might as well be Shadows. He can't call his Persona anymore, not without putting his life at risk, but that doesn't mean he can't fight. And if this shit's not going to approach him, it gives him an advantage.

And so he closes in on what looks like a giant crystalline version of Ekoda that's shouting at some poor kid about something Shinji's never heard of (but is probably just as much of a boring nightmare as anything covered in Gekkoukan's version of Classic Lit), ready to strike. Why there was a bus stop sign, of all things, sitting around, he doesn't know - but this isn't the time to question it, and really, he doesn't care enough to.

Now's the time to kick some ass.

▶ THE CALL KNOWS WHERE YOU LIVE...

[ Desmond Miles thought he’d about seen it all, honestly-- or, at the very least, felt like he had. End of the world? Check. Wars? Check. The best and worst of humanity? Check and check.

Then there’s this nonsense.

The whole of the world is made of arts and crafts supplies, he’s been given yet another crazy story that he was supposed to somehow believe, pulled from time (again, now only literally) to another world entirely, and he is Not Happy about it. What next? No, seriously, that's something Desmond legitimately wants to know. Because, hey, who cares that he has a disaster to prevent, some key to find? Not the Arcana, apparently. Never mind this weird psychic network thing; something Desmond’s leaving alone for now. He needs a little time to process all of this. What a mess, right?

Well, considering there isn’t much Desmond can do about it right at the moment, that’s where you come in, friend. Finding him either up one of the plastic trees trying to get a good look around or doing his damnedest to get to that barn on the horizon, attempting to look for people of some kind. Now if only it would actually get closer instead of the (seemingly) same distance… ]

▶ TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE PLOT...

[ Or choose your own adventure! ]

[ The one thing that Cal never expected--well one of the things--after everything that had happened to him? Was standing on a country-side road, looking either way almost in a daze. After a breath he snaps out of it and his survival instincts kick into gear. A strange unfamiliar place, otherworldly and disconnected? The last time he was in a place like that---had they somehow stuck him in the Animus again without him knowing?

No, because then the place wouldn't look like something out of one of those 7 A.M. kid's shows.

He tilts his head back to look up at the sky. Maybe he has finally gone crazy. Snapped completely from the Bleeding Effect, sitting in a room like the Infinity Room, just blindly staring at a ceiling without really knowing it. All of this can be in his head and he'll never really know for sure. ]

Prompt 43

Liminal Space had always been weird in Kazuichi's opinion, but this was still a little bit too strange in his opinion. Maybe if he was into knitting or something, he'd be able to enjoy it but for a mechanic like him there wasn't much to do. No voices of engines, no robotic sound and worst of all: nothing to tinker with. It's almost like being back at the island, but even there he had something. Like his alarm clock.

"Why would you even ride an iron? The sensation of an engine underneath you is the best part of a vehicle..!" Well, for Kazuichi it's the only good part, considering his horrible motion sickness. "They don't even look like I can dismantle them."

His best option was probably going back to the workshop to work on something there. There were others who enjoying tinkering like he did, so he'd be able to get some parts and ideas from them at least. He should really learn his way to manipulating liminal space itself.

Prompt 44 (infiltrating)

As the Adversary of Tinkering, Zechs wasn't very interested in helping out the poor students against the Proctors. There wasn't anything for him but danger and that didn't suit a coward like him. Coward and a little selfish, he tended to just sit back and watch what was going on around him.

Occasionally, he does interact with the poor students - just to send them back to where they were so they wouldn't trouble him. "What do I look like, a charity worker?"

When the Proctors happen to notice him, he's well on his way to escape from where he is - quickly building something with his magic to fly off.

Shaun groans at the light above, he prefers cities to the country. More places to hide for one thing, and in the country Wifi usually sucks if it exists at all. He shifts his bag over his shoulder from habit. It's just comforting to know that it's still there mostly. Blinking again he sighs as he removes his glasses to clean them on the hem of his jumper.

Though this causes him to quirk a brow, the field he's found himself on looks like it's fabric, reminding him a little of one of the games that came out a while ago. He sees a road about four meters away, in the distance is a farmhouse, maybe he could get answers there. Clicking behind him makes him turn, seeing what looks like a sheep made of wool, crochet into the shape of the wool-bearing animal. "Okay either I've been drugged up, or I'm dead."

The later was probably more plausible, though he really thought that the afterlife might have more pearly gates, less... moving stuffed toys? Not that he fully believed all that. He was just glad that the ground was solid at the moment.

Prompt #43

Visiting strange worlds is nothing new for Axel. It's a normal, everyday part of the job. The Organization is pretty fond of sending its members out on recon missions. And recon wouldn't exactly be recon if it consisted of visiting the same familiar place day after day.

Not that Axel's been doing recon lately. Well, not exactly. He's been a little preoccupied with other orders. Infiltration. Weeding out traitors. Becoming a traitor himself. That sort of thing.

So it's been a while, since he's seen anything quite like ... this. Sure, there was that book-world from Sora's memories. But Axel's pretty sure this takes the cake.

The Nobody rests a hand on his hip and tilts his head to the side, eyeing the crocheted llama critically.

"Huh. Can it even taste that?" he wonders, looking at the pile of hay — er, fabric-hay — by the llama's side. "Or ... anything?"

The llama stares, silent but for its seemingly aimless chewing.

If Axel knew the warning signs for a llama gearing up to spit, he probably wouldn't bother trying to figure out whether or not the creature can taste. And he definitely wouldn't be standing so close.

Threaded | Flat

Xena | Xena: Warrior Princess

Drizzt Do'Urden | The Legend of Drizzt Novels, OTA to potential newbies and everyone else

no subject