Test Drive Meme #8

[hadrielmods]

Welcome to Hadriel's test drive, and thank you again for your interest in the game! As always, our reserves page is here, and our applications page is here! Reserves open April 24th, and apps are open May 1st.

Two quick points here as well:

1. Any thread made in Hadriel's test drive will be accepted as the sole Action Log sample in the application.
2. All threads made in the test drive can be considered game canon, either through handwaving or through a shared mental experience while coming through the Door!

Test drives will be broken up into specific god mini-events, during which your characters can see how well they fare under the watchful eye of one of the gods. Choose wisely or just simply pick 'em all, and have fun!

F E A R

SCENARIO ONE: DEAD FLESH BUFFET
[The Door brings in all that is chaotic and evil in the world. This may include you, may include the person next to you... and may include the monster behind you.

Watch out as you explore the streets of Hadriel, because you're not alone, and there's always something lurking in the shadows, waiting for the perfect chance to swarm around you and chow down. This time, the Door has brought in a group of rotfiends, from the video game The Witcher.

These unpleasant-looking creatures are necrophages, meaning they feed on the flesh of the dead, and if that flesh is in short supply they are happy to add to it. Normally found in groups, they are fast and difficult to corner. What's more, when on the verge of death, they have an annoying tendency to explode into a flammable cloud of poisonous toxins. You left your torch at home, right?]

R A G E
SCENARIO TWO: MMM WHATCHA SAY
[There you were, just walking along the street, minding your own business like a good underground hell-city citizen, when all of a sudden you saw someone. It was like love at first sight - if by 'love' you mean 'deep burning hatred'. You've never wanted to kill someone so much, and why? Well, you're not really sure, but there's probably a reason! You'll just have to figure it out. Or not. Who needs a reason for murder, anyway?

Or maybe you're the one someone else has targeted. Maybe you know they're after you and you're desperately trying to watch your back. Why do they hate you? You don't even know them. Or maybe you do, maybe they're your best friend. Either way, this is a super awkward situation, and someone might end up dead. Hopefully not you!

This is a mini version of our Assassin event this month!]


H O P E

SCENARIO THREE: SCRATCH OFF
[This morning, you received a scratch ticket in the mail (who knew Hadriel even had mail?), addressed to you. The instructions are clear enough - scratch off three matching icons, and you win a prize! Sure, okay. But here's the grand prize: a one-way ticket home.

Unfortunately, try as you might, you aren't gonna win that one, but keep hoping! And hey, just think of all the other GREAT PRIZES you could win: an inflatable duck, a plastic ring to give your sweetheart, an empty can of Red Bull, a cell phone charm shaped like a strange green creature with a boner.

So what if you didn't win that ticket home? You got something almost as good: a shitty prize! Thanks, Hope!]

Comments

Re: hope.

[corundum]

[She looks up from the middle of scratching off another card when Mello speaks, giving him a quick glance--interesting look, maybe a priest or an old-school vampire hunter?--and then a friendly smile.]

Not sobriety chips, but I think someone has an interesting sense of humor anyway since they're apparently lotto prizes.

[She slides him an unscratched ticket.]

Want to try your luck?

[torrefied]

[He's already had one encounter with the idiotic scratch tickets - not amusing in the slightest, in his opinion - but an ordinary person wouldn't refuse the offer, he estimates. He may as well.]

Sure. You can't win if you don't play, right?

[There's a hint of a smile curved across his mouth as he says this, though there's a hard edge to it, and the smile disappears completely, merging into a pinched scowl by the time he finishes revealing his prize - a single solid white jigsaw puzzle piece.]

Well, this is pretty useless.

[Mello does his best to sound casual about it, but underneath that mask, he's seething with irritation.]

[corundum]

[She watches with a small smile on her face, the expression carefully amused but not unkind; she takes note of his scowl, and that he's clearly not finding this whole thing very fun.]

Hey, maybe if we collect enough of them we can complete the picture. Think it's a white dog in a snowstorm or something?

[She doesn't for a moment think the jigsaw puzzle is actually part of a picture, even an entirely blank one.]

So what's your name?

[torrefied]

Hard to tell from just one piece.

[He would be shocked if it belonged to anything except one of Near's blank puzzles. But there's no sense in talking about that here - Near is another world away, and if the reminder is someone's idea of a joke, Mello has no intention of letting on that he doesn't find it funny - any more than he's already let slip, at least. He tucks the puzzle piece into the inside pocket of his jacket and returns his attention to her.]

Mello. And you?

[corundum]

Ruby. Want a drink? Seems there's a little of whatever here.

[She stands up on the rungs of her barstool without waiting for an answer, too short to reach anything over the counter without really leaning for it, but she does manage to close her fingers around a bottle of rum and sit back down in triumph. Even if he doesn't want it, she'll drink it.]

[torrefied]

Sure.

[He doesn't, really, but who goes to a bar if they're not going to drink? He can pretend, the same way he's been pretending with the bottle of beer since he got here.]

Say, you wouldn't happen to be running this place, would you?

[corundum]

[She grabs a nearby glass and pours some of the rum for him, as well as filling up her own glass.]

Nope. Just found myself in this crazy cave-city today.

[And decided to help herself at the bar, because she deserves it.]

[torrefied]

I see ... well, you seemed to know your way around the bar here. I just wondered if maybe you owned the place.

[That's interesting, that she's only just arrived. Mello makes a note of that, because he too just found himself here. Two isn't quite enough to make a pattern, but it's a good place to start.]

Where were you before?

[corundum]

I just find it easy to make myself at home.

[An understatement, accompanied with a small smile that isn't a smirk but isn't quite the sweet-friendly she's been playing at either.

But she allows it to fade entirely at his question, deciding between a semi-truthful answer to gain sympathy or a guarded, purposefully vague one.]

In a church.

[True, but not extremely so, and she decides to down her shot after her words to add the obvious hint that there's more to the story.]

How about you?

[torrefied]

[One gloved hand closes around the rosary hung around his neck. In a church is where Mello planned to be this time tomorrow, waiting for death to find him. There's no possible way she could know this - he hadn't even told Matt what his final plan had been - but even as a coincidence, it cuts a little too closely for Mello's taste, a faint frown working its way into his expression.]

Japan. On business.

[More to the story there, too, clearly.]

That's on hold now, obviously.

[He's not bitter about it. Really.]