synodiporia_ooc | Test Drive #21

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test drive

Test Drive #21

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 than 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 September 16th–26th. Our next Jaunt will be Night Falls on Yensid, a fantasy Jaunt taking place in a formerly magic kingdom whose history went awry when other Travelers failed to properly complete a previous Jaunt there, one of the many forgotten Jaunts from before Synodiporia properly began as a Dreamwidth game. There will be no Walkabout run alongside this Jaunt.

Prompt #55 takes place in a punishment Liminal Space for a Jaunt that the Travelers failed to solve.
Prompt #56 takes place during the first Jaunt the Travelers made to the Kingdom of Yensid, during its Golden Age.

#55

It’s difficult to make out the shape of this Liminal Space, at first, thanks to the decor; it’s somehow both pitch black and eye-searingly bright at the same time, the pulsing rainbow patterns cutting through the darkness making it all but impossible to properly judge distance. The truly persistent, or those who manage to abuse Liminal ‘down is relative’ gravity without hitting a pitfall for long enough, may eventually determine that it seems to be a giant egg. More so than many iterations of Liminal Space, it’s completely closed off.

Unfortunately, that’s going to be very difficult indeed to figure out. It’s not just the impossible coloration that makes navigation difficult; there’s a terrible storm raging, and the whipping winds and cracking thunder make it all too easy to stumble into a pitfall by accident. And those pitfalls don’t exactly want to let go of anyone they ensnare, either. Errant Travelers may find themselves supporting an impossibly heavy overhead weight, or pushing a boulder eternally uphill, or trying to catch an ever-lowering drink of water, or pouring water into a tub riddled with gaping cracks, or any number of other seemingly endless, pointless tasks. They can be escaped with help from another Traveler, or one person can be released from the task when another stumbles in.

The only respite from this - the colors, the storm, the punishments - is in the form of Travelers’ created spaces, but those are as difficult to get to right now as everything else. Good luck.

#56

It's a chaotic time for the Kingdom of Yensid. The Amulet of Yensid, that fabled magical artifact that must be rejoined each lunar year so that the kingdom's three races can continue their peaceful magical coexistence, has gone missing. Two-thirds of it, the humans' fragment and the Forest Folk's fragment, are nowhere to be found. The capital city is just as bustling as ever despite this, with reptilian Stonefolk flitting from place to place in their usual parkour-like fashion, small animal-like Forest Folk hawking various potions and crafts, and humans making all sorts of deals.

There's an undercurrent of urgency to the day's business. Small groups of three or four of various species move through the city with enchanted mirrors, dowsing rods, fishing lures, and all other manner of magical items designed to aid in the act of finding something, but so far, no one's turned up anything solid yet. A few of the stronger magicked items are leading their owners out towards the foreboding Birdlime Mountains, but that's the most promising lead anyone has.

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Eliot glances up at Jean, meeting his frank gaze with a flat, brown-eyed stare. The corner of his mouth that already turns up due to the cast of his jaw quirks higher.

"Don't have to do what?" he asks, making it clear that the magician is not an easy person.

Which might be a little surprising to Jean - as a keen observer, he's no doubt noticed that almost everything about Eliot is affected, from the way he talks to his clothing and hair, to the air of bored nonchalance he puts on. He makes no effort to hide it - when one is talking to Eliot, one is seldom getting the genuine article, and he doesn't really care who knows it. He built who he is from the ground up, out of the ashes of a bullied misfit kid from Eastern Oregon, and he's not ashamed of that. So part of Eliot is all about appearances and not the slightest bit about hard truths, but for whatever reason, he seems unwilling to politely acknowledge Jean's out.

Then he shakes his head, his smile still slightly bitter and self-depreciating as adds, "I notice you didn't say that you don't want that."

The shallots are thrown into the bowl with the sauce, and then the herbs are added - fresh basil, rosemary, thyme, the garlic from the pan - and then mixed in with quick, easy movements. It's clear the magician is at home in the kitchen as he moves through it, turning on the oven to preheat while still holding the bowl and barely missing a beat with the mixing. It's almost balletic, the way his lanky body moves.

Edited (THAT TAG WAS NOT FINISHED OOPS) 2017-09-19 00:37 (UTC)

"Huh."

From where Jean stands, all that effort seems exhausting, even when he knows it is there for a very good reason. Jean has never tried to fit anywhere or cared about what others thought of him. Their opinions never caused pain or pleasure. He never felt like he should support or contradict their expectations in any way. Jean Otus moves through life being nothing but himself, caring only for the opinion of those very few who mean something to him. It never occurs to him to do otherwise.

It must be difficult to be Eliot. Difficult and desolate. It's nothing short of admirable that he manages to be how he is and even create beautiful things. Jean realizes that he really likes watching him cook. On top of that, it smells delicious.

"What I want most is to see him living his life and having fun." he says honestly.

Eliot is a deeply unhappy person, probably because he does care. Because he feels things on a deep, gut level, and that damaged him when he was younger - his parents and brothers were kind-hearted but often thoughtlessly cruel in their inability to see that actually, there was nothing wrong with Eliot, he was just different. Now that he's no longer a child, he's narrowed his scope of people who's opinions mean a damn considerably but lately things haven't been going as well, and the depression, the darkness below the surface has been leaking out in all sorts of ways.

Not that he would ever, ever talk about that. But yes. It is difficult and exhausting to be him, and it is slowly hollowing him out.

Instead he takes a sip of wine and sets aside the tomato sauce, turning to the salmon. He takes the cigarette Jean had offered earlier and lights it with a snap of his fingers, sticking it in the corner of his mouth so he can use both hands.

"Very altruistic," he drawls, pulling a knife from the block so he can fillet the fish neatly, then slice it into steaks. "But apparently what he most wants is to hang out with you. Or he did, when you were teenagers. He single?"

Jean can see those signs. Depression is not unheard of where he comes from, and he wishes to help, because that's the sort of person he is. However, he wouldn't push too much if he can help it. They have just met and he knows the value of privacy. Besides, he fears that would only cause Eliot to buttress his very solid walls.

Doesn't stop him from stealing a fried garlic clove and tucking it into his mouth. It tastes like heaven and he has no regrets.

"We are very close." he acknowledges with a little affectionate smile, sipping his wine with great care. "But he could have anyone he wanted. I lost count of how many love letters I was asked to deliver to him."

And Nino thoroughly rejected all of them. Yes, Eliot can probably tell by Jean's quiet evasion that his friend is very much single. However, Jean attributes that to Nino's carefully woven secrets as a royal agent, and the fact that it was Nino's duty to shadow him.

Eliot is not off the mark when it comes to Jean's altruism either. He is ruled by necessities and low expectations. When his parents died, there was not much time for grieving because he had to take care of his sister's grief. She was much younger than him, and so he had to work, study and be a passable guardian, otherwise she would have been taken away. And if she were, what would be the point?

All he wants for himself is to keep those he cares about close, or at least safe and doing what they want of their lives. He has never learned how to expect more.

"He is perfectly capable of having all the lovers he wants. But I'm the only friend he has. Fifteen years." Thirty for Nino. "And neither of us are very good at making friends."

Not the sort of thing one would risk over a blowjob, he adds to himself. Nino deserves better.

"Pity, I was going to ask for his number," Eliot says lightly. "But I guess it wouldn't do any good if he's in love with you."

The magician is devastatingly intelligent - most magicians have to be - but he tends to come across as merely clever. Witty. The truth is, though, it doesn't take an in-depth description to see the writing on the wall. It makes narrative sense, doesn't it? The devoted, supposedly straight best friend. The oblivious cop, who never seems to make the connection between all the people apparently throwing themselves at this Nino and the fact that Nino only wants time with Jean. It's all so sweet, and stupid, and absolutely nothing like the depressing mess he's made with Janet and Quentin. Eliot, after all, knows what it is to be on both sides of that equation, but his life is much messier, much nastier than this cop's, he'd bet money.

"You might want to watch that, Mr. Inspector," he adds, and he sounds tired. Exhausted. He turns away from Jean to get the sauce, then lays the fish in the baking dish, squeezing lemon over each steak before covering them in the fragrant tomato sauce. He slides them into the oven silently, considering his choices for noodles as he slips the cigarette to the other side of his mouth.

If it is hard to watch Eliot, Jean can't even imagine what it's like to be Eliot.

"Mm, I don't know if you would get along." he says, lighting another cigarette for himself. "Too many sharp edges."

It is not the first time that Jean has been the source of envy, but Eliot seems too burrowed in his own pain to treat him with the usual malice. Or maybe - and he is more and more certain of that with every passing moment - Eliot is simply a good person in his own way.

"Why don't you take a minute to sit down and dry yourself?" he asks casually. "There's bread. Any other culinary miracle you have in mind can wait until you finish your glass."

In Jean's experience, bread solves most problems.

Eliot's quite amazed at Jean's ability to dodge any tricky questions or comments that he doesn't want to address. It makes the perverse side of him want to poke harder, but he suppresses the urge - the man's a stranger, and he's been nothing but pleasant and polite to the magician.

"Timing," he says instead, "Is everything in cooking. I'll sit down in a moment, but the water has to go on first ... I'm feeling too lazy today to do the noodles properly, so we'll have to go with boxed."

His nose wrinkles with slight distaste, but the prospect of getting the dough ready and making the fettuccine from scratch is a bit much right now. Instead he fills a pot with water and sets it on the stove, turning the burner on low. "Let's just hope this isn't like fairy food ... "

Finally, though, he swallows the last of his wine, ambles over to pour himself another glass, and pulls himself up to sit on a clean section of counter on the kitchen island, his long legs hanging.

"So, I'm working on a theory here," Eliot says, finally looking over at Jean again. "Indulge me, Mr. Inspector. What country are you from? What does the ACCA stand for?"

Jean is the emperor of passive resistance. Dodging Eliot's questions is not very different from dodging his sister's.

Predictably, it drives her crazy.

He is happy to see the man sit down at last, and is ready to suffer the sad fate of boxed noodles just for that.Finding a chair for himself, he takes another sip of wine. Eliot's comment about fairy food only makes his next question more interesting.

"I like your theory. Shall we?"he asks smoothly, cheeks flushed with the first effects of alcohol. "My country is the kingdom of Dowa, and ACCA is an organization responsible for most public services. Police, firefighting, traffic control...You name it."

He picks up his overcoat and turns it around, showing the red bird shaped insignia on its shoulder badges.

"It's been around for a century, and any child would know that."

Edited 2017-09-19 14:01 (UTC)

Eliot looks at the bird - similar to others he's seen, but not as the marker of any organization or national emblem. Nor has he ever heard of Dowa, but then there are lots of countries who call themselves something different than what the rest of the world does. And why won't Jean say what it actually stands for? Is it not an acronym at all?

"So the ACCA must be a national organization ... under a king or queen, since Dowa is kingdom? And since you expected me to know it, you must assume I'm from there, too. What language are we speaking together?"

As he asks, Eliot picks up the wine bottle and tops off Jean's glass. It's an automatic gesture, something he seems to be paying little attention to - he's hosted plenty of dinner parties in his time, after all.

"It must always be a king." he informs, drinking slowly, but the wine gets a little to him anyway. "And the relationship between ACCA and the royal family is one of checks and balances. Why, it's in the constitution."

Jean doesn't think Eliot comes from anywhere but Jean's mind, but he says the name of the language they are speaking since he was asked, and it's definitively not English. He can't help but wonder why his subconscious is drilling him in grammar school's government and politics.

((ooc: definitively an acronym! But we don't know what it means. Canon only tells us it has a namesake: "acca" - the red bird they use as a symbol, their equivalent to the white dove of peace.))

"Mm," Eliot says, finishing up his second cigarette and stubbing it out before taking another thoughtful swallow of the wine. He is very much not a light-weight, though the warmth of the room is lending a flush to his cheeks, as well.

"And what would you say if I told you I come from a country called America, a republic with a president, and I hear us both speaking in English, the language of the English empire?" he asks after a moment. "Any of that sound familiar to you, at all?"

Yeah...Jean is going to put that glass down before he makes a spectacle of himself. He rubs his flushed face before looking up at Eliot with tired though compliant eyes, like a man who has been been preparing himself for bad news from his doctor, and got exactly what he expected.

"Those are merely random words to me."

Truth be told, some districts attempted to have presidents in the past, but that was long before ACCA was created. Back in the age of chaos and war.

"Is there a concept of alternate dimensions or other worlds were you're from?" Eliot asks, watching the blond with interest. He wonders what Jean had thought was going on. That this was just a dream, or a hallucination? That he was back home, but had been kidnapped somewhere unfamiliar?

"Well..." he replies tentatively. "Some of us believe in such things as God and angels..."

But he's quite sure that's not what Eliot is asking.

"We have fairytales and fiction, but nobody would be able to light a cigarette with magic.."

Jean's world is as non-magical as a world can get, which is why he's so certain nothing here can possibly be real.

"Where do you think we are?" Eliots asks, bluntly. "What do you think is going on?"

It's the sort of question he would have dodged if it was not for the kitchen warmth, the scent of delicious food and the soft wine buzz. He does, however, take his time to finish his cigarette, before looking up at Eliot once more with a faint sad smile.

"I think I'm insane."

Eliot smiles, and there's that bitter edge to it again, but his voice is, perhaps surprisingly, kind when he replies.

"So I'm just a marvelous figment that your mind has conjured up? You must be incredibly creative."

He ducks his head a little.

"I'm sorry. I had the feeling you wouldn't like that."

People usually don't enjoy being told they don't exist.

"...Marvelous, especially the salmon. That's a really nice touch."

"If I'm a figment," Eliot replies, standing and stretching his long body, "Then I don't have the ability to like or dislike anything. I'm just a collection of firing neurons in your head, so please, don't spare my feelings. Let yourself go, you seem like the kind of guy who could use it."

He sets about getting the fettuccine ready for the pot, which is now at a slow boil. His expression has gone from that more wry, bitter smile which was probably more true to something aloof and affected again. Showing who he really is to anyone, displaying any genuine emotion, seldom seems worth it. And really, it's kind of funny, isn't it? A story to tell Quentin or Janet or Josh later.

The second glass of wine disappears in three gulps, and he pours himself a third while starting to chop a second bowl of fresh herbs that can be mixed with olive oils and a little crushed tomato for bruschetta.

"Hey," he protests good-naturedly. "I'm not holding myself back."

Which is an obvious lie, but Jean is doing what he wants to do, and he doesn't want to be mean.

"Besides, wouldn't that qualify as masochism?" he asks gently, saddened by Eliot's change. It's like watching someone walk barefoot on broken glass. "Personally, I've always thought that suffering was overrated."

Bruschetta sounds like a lovely idea. He stands up and brings the bread out of the refrigerator. White, not Lotta's homemade. And most certainly not his mother's, but it will have to do.

"What do you think is going on?"

"Don't you mean, 'What does one inexplicable part of my mind that my subconscious has named Eliot? think is going on?" the magician asks archly. "You don't suppose this is some kind of fantasy hallucination, do you? Do I actually have a six-pack now?"

He glances down at himself with a little smirk - there are no perfectly toned muscles hiding under that shirt, the man is very nearly a beanpole - but he's not about to strip for the sake of a joke. Instead he starts to mix the herbs, adding in olive oil a drizzle at a time.

"I think we're both in a world that isn't ours. I know there are other worlds, I've seen the portals to them, and been through one - a lot of old and quite ornate fountains in a place called the Neitherlands. I'm not sure how we got here - last I remember I was trying to chat up a satyr. Or was he a faun? I forget the difference. Anyway, I certainly don't remember any fountain. But still, here we are, and I don't think this place belongs to your world or mine. And I have a sneaking suspicion that if we were to walk around more out there - " he gestures in the direction of the door, "We'd find more people like us. From places who's names we don't recognize."

Jean let's out a little noise that's almost a laugh.

"No six-pack, but cooking, cigarette lighting and cloth drying are much more sensible approaches to a man's heart anyway."

Isn't that what dreams are supposed to be about? Wish fulfillment? Maybe madness follows a similar logic. He is starting to come up with a loose theory about why Eliot is here, though being Jean's theory, it's practical rather than romantic.

"As much as your hypothesis is far more exciting than mine, Lotta and Nino would be upset if I suddenly disappeared." Not to mention the resulting political issues of nationwide proportions. "If I'm just crazy, they will at least know where I am...Unless your fauns or perhaps satyrs told you anything about time being retaliative when one is hopping realities."

That said, he doesn't mind looking for other people after the rain stops - if it ever stops.

"So I am your fantasy man?" Eliot asks, sounding amused, but also with a slightly flirtatious cock of his head to one side, briefly touching a finger to his lower lip as if in thought, before adding some crushed cherry tomatoes to his mix, then turning to check the noodles.

"And actually, yes. Well, not the fauns. But we've found that time does seem to pass differently in different worlds, and all of it is different to the Neitherlands. Fillory, for example - the world we'd traveled to - had time that passed much more rapidly than Earth. It made it quite difficult to coordinate at first."

He glances over his shoulder at Jean (and really, the rear view isn't bad at all, if one likes slender men with long, long legs), adding, "But who knows how it's passing here. We;d have to go back to know for certain, and then, know when, exactly, we'd left. And it seems highly unlikely that it would be that simple. Things never are."

Just because Jean brought that on himself, that doesn't mean he knows how to react to Eliot's blatant flirting. It also doesn't help that the last time he assumed someone was flirting with him it was...a bit of a disaster. He stares back with round, blue eyes and goes a darker shade of pink that may or may not be the wine getting to him.

"It would be convenient if they didn't notice our absence at all. Am I right to assume, Mr. Magician, that in spite of your experience, you have no idea how to leave our current location? After our meal, of course."

He crosses his long, long legs and gives Eliot a self-contained, challenging smile. He wouldn't look that different from some noir movie hero if he was not still blushing like a dolt.

Edited 2017-09-22 02:04 (UTC)

"Walk, I assume," Eliot says, and his eyes do drop briefly to Jean's legs. The blond definitely isn't his usual type, but that blush does add charm, and the inspector is certainly attractive enough. The magician likes men who try to play worldly and tough when they're clearly still inexperienced in certain areas. It's cute.

He turns back to the noodles, stirring them idly again before taking up the loaf of bread that Jean brought out, and arranging some slices on a baking sheet. He brushes on the mixture of oil, herbs, and tomatoes, then slides them into the oven to warm and crisp a little. As he works, he keeps talking.

"But if you mean to ask if I know how to get home, I'm afraid not. Last time I moved between worlds it was with a magic button, but I haven't got it. It wasn't mine to begin with, I was just tagging along with someone else. But isn't all of this moot? It's all in your head, anyway."

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