Test Drive Meme #10

[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 June 24th, and apps are open July 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: UNBEARABLE
[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 several bereskarn, from the Dragon Age video game series.

While they were once normal bears, these hideous creatures have been corrupted by the Blight into something terrible. They are larger than normal bears and have bone spikes jutting out through their skin, which leaves them with constantly bleeding wounds. They are easily enraged, and will attack fiercely if agitated. Have fun!]

SCENARIO TWO: CLAMOROUS CAVES
[Wow, it sure is weirdly foggy out, considering there's no weather in Hadriel. The sun's dim, the light's strange, and hey - is that an air raid siren? Oh shit.

Welcome to Silent Hill, Hadriel edition. When the siren sounds, the city changes into a twisted, darker version of itself, teeming with monsters and looking like something straight out of your nightmares. And if you're really unlucky, there might be a monster lurking in there just for you, your own personal demon ready to hunt you down. Let's hope you can stay alive until the city changes back!

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


R A G E

SCENARIO THREE: NO FLAMES PLZ
[This morning you woke up to a letter on your doorstep, addressed to you. Curious, since there's no mail delivery in Hadriel. Upon opening it, you discovered a carefully written letter containing a brutal takedown of something that means a lot to you. Something you really care about

Maybe they're trashing your favorite sports team. Maybe they're calling your hometown a trash pit full of hipsters. Maybe they're saying your boyfriend has weird hair. Or maybe it's worse than that - maybe they're saying that everything you've been working for is a complete waste of time, and you're an idiot for trying. Whatever it is, it's calculated just right to piss you off, and piss you off real bad. And hey. That letter's signed.

Maybe somebody will come by and talk you down - or maybe the person who comes by is the one who's name is on that letter, even if it might not quite be in their handwriting. What're you gonna do? Fight them? Lay an elaborate trap? Try not to let it get to you and talk it out like adults? Yeah right. Time for a reckoning.]

Comments

sorry for the late reply!

[somuchlove]

[Chara continues to walk around but they stay close enough so they can still see the skeleton. Although it was talks of friendship that would be their warning sign rather than falling asleep, letting their guard down wasn't really something Chara did. They knew first hand that Sans could move a lot faster than one might think.

As for the temple itself, it's very interesting. Less for what it looked like and more for what Chara was actually feeling. Creeping up on them was fear, although it was more boogieman in the closet fear that a child might have rather than anything dangerous. Still, they actually felt something.]

Interesting. This place can affect me.

np! i saw that reserve........o.o

[skelebro]

[He watches them with eyesockets at half-mast, grin frozen to his skull. Pity they come from a time where they know all his little tricks and japes. Not that he's about to break that out without reason, but...well, it's nice to have contingency plans.

Everyone can be a good person if they try though, right? Even if their life terminates in something unspeakable, a gaping void that severs every available timestream and silences it entirely.

Before long, that anxiety, that reverberating horror for that gaping nothingness, starts to claw its way up his ribcage.

Sans coughs.]

Gettin' scared yet?

who wants their best buddy in Hardriel? =)

[somuchlove]

[...it was like a tidal wave of power the first time it happened. Like a rock being sandblasted away to nothing. Chara had felt the feedback from them, for what it was worth before they tried again. Shock. Awe. Fear that someone like that was that powerful. Even the Undying was not like this.

*You feel your sins crawling on your back.]

I am. It's very interesting. All of them are like this, aren't they?

=)

[skelebro]

["Interesting." Yeah, that would be the word they'd use. When you're that full of LOVE, so distant and removed from yourself, when you can feel nothing at all...well, it would be a stimulating mental exercise at worst. Feeling things. Feeling anything at all.]

Yep. All the temples for all the gods.

[He sinks his hands a little deeper into his pockets. It chills him, right down to the marrow.]

Might be better to stick to Hope.

[somuchlove]

Hope. I suppose many would enjoy that temple.

[They remember Asgore saying it many times. "You are the future of humans and monsters!", or something like that. Their Hope. Perhaps, back then, it meant something.

Horribly pointless now. Toriel was dead, Asgore was next. And so on.]

Is there a penalty for staying too long besides these emotions?

[Color them curious, now that they're actually feeling things.]

[skelebro]

[Yeah. Many would. Himself included, but he'd never admit it. Hope is too synonymous with things he finds unattainable these days. How do you find hope when you deliberately deny yourself access to such things? Delight's better, if only marginally. Delight's wrapped in happy memories.

Fear is typical. And Rage...Rage is too much work for someone like him. Right up there with hatred in his list of unnecessary feelings to feel.]

I'd be the wrong guy to ask. You telling me you can really feel anything, with all that LOVE inside you?

[somuchlove]

[Chara smiles. It's been a long, long time since they had to think that far back.]

A little, like a pinch. And before we walked this path I felt their joy for you all.

[So yeah, a little bit. It's not like everything started at LV 20, you know. But it's enough for them to be interested in it, that something could force fear through all that LOVE and Chara to actually feel it.

They'd have to speak to these Gods and see what they were like in person.]

[skelebro]

The kid's?

[Now this is interesting. Getting to sort all the different aspects of the anomaly. Sounds like it's some kind of gestalt, multiple actors in the same space. God but charting the spiking DT activity had been a real chore. Impossible to really determine (heh) if he'd missed anything.

So this time the kid has a body of their own. Not acting within chosen parameters of someone else's body. Did the gods do that, or is that the result of having accumulated this much LOVE?]

So you weren't independent in all this, huh?

[somuchlove]

[Now this is also interesting. It's not like there was much time for chit-chat with Sans when they always moved on before anything friendly began. They knew the jokes, they knew Papyrus's puzzles. When everything was turning into nothing but dust, what was the point? It was only that warning that really broke the monotony.

So a long chat with one of two monsters really able to kill them was certainly something.]

No. I was there but I watched as they found love with you. And then they went down the path of genocide and I came. I was called.

[They don't say that for nothing. As soon as the first life was taken, Chara appeared.]

[skelebro]

You make that choice yourself? Or is that just how you figured it all worked out?

[So. Now he's genuinely curious. Never mind how the physics of the whole thing factored into it - presumably this was the kid's SOUL as an active agent, with something like...an eighth of another human's SOUL - as a kind of substrate? Never mind that two human SOULs in the same non-monster vessel should be impossible, but so should the ability for time to become a non-streamlined, nonlinear vector, so no one's happy anyway.

The kid made the choice to tear the Underground to pieces. That little tidbit comes with a dull ring of weary acceptance. Of course, right? How long does it take before someone like them gets bored? Won't ever be happy, right?]

[somuchlove]

In a way. The normal endings were complete. Perhaps even the happiest ending came. But they decided to push things to the brink and gathered EXP and LOVE.

[So all that? Hinged on a 'What if?'. Those who liked completing games were fickle things. They had to know and see everything until there was nothing left. And then...]

But I have a curiosity to settle. Did you ever learn their name?

[skelebro]

[Perhaps the happiest...yeah. Still that photo in one of the drawers to his workshop. The kid, and everyone else, alive and happy. And himself, smiling like always.

Gotta wonder if that version of him was really happy, or if he just couldn't put to rest the worry that the kid would get bored. Well, he was right in any case, wasn't he?

Yeah. He was.]

Who, the kid? Does it matter?

["Anomaly" isn't exactly a real personable title.]

You ever learn yours?

[somuchlove]

Of course. I was born with a name. But that was just a curiosity. Thank you.

[They didn't care about that happy ending. Honestly, humans getting along with monsters was a disaster waiting to happen. Humans were cruel, awful beings. It wouldn't happen.]

Now. Now there is one more thing left to do.

[skelebro]

[Names are tricky beasts. Maybe he could recall the name if he really thought about it but...sounds like work. And he's not one for that.

He eyes them, a little warily.]

What's that, then?

[somuchlove]

[They're not going to talk about Flowey yet, but...]

Only Asgore is left. But in that time there might be a reconsideration.

[Their partner may try to back out. Chara had zero plans on letting that happen, but they want to see if there's any reaction with the idea of one final, maybe better, Reset. They themselves wanted to push a little more.]

[skelebro]

[All right, so that's...not what he expected. If he's taken aback, however, he doesn't show it.]

Why? Just to see what might happen?

[somuchlove]

You are under the assumption that seeing what happens is the point, aren't you?

[Because everything has to be explored, right? Every last inch. So maybe there's a tiny, tiny hope that things could be fixed? Maybe?

Yeah, right.]

[skelebro]

Well, I won't lie. I'm not sure what else your motivation might be.

[Because you "can," you "have to" and all that jazz. He elucidated himself pretty articulately the last time they...met.]

[somuchlove]

Then I suppose that is your only answer. It is interesting to speak to someone who is both in and out of the loop.

[Like watching a film that randomly rewinds or splices different parts with each other. The motivations of the characters are the same but the paths differ. Good Ending, Bad Ending, Game Over and so on.

They both were returning to that monotony again, weren't they?]

[skelebro]

Well, I'm glad one of us is having fun.

[Or should he say Fun?

...no. No, he really shouldn't.]

You didn't exactly make your motives crystal clear, kid. Just your endgame.

[somuchlove]

[If anything is going to survive, it's probably the horrible jokes and puns. But moving on.]

Would you be happy with the answer I have? To know more about why they had to die? I will tell you. But. But there is something I need. You will give it to me.

[Well? It may not be the first thing that jumps to mind, actually. But to the surprise of no one Chara isn't planning on telling Sans what it is until he says yes or no.

Think carefully. There is always more than one way to skin a cat, regarding LOVE.]

[skelebro]

Is it my SOUL? 'Cause, uh, it's taken.

[And who'd want a measly little SOUL like his, anyway? All wrung-out and dry, little more than a 1-HP, one-hit wonder. Nothing special.]

Well, you know me, kiddo. I'm always happy.

[somuchlove]

[Chara laughs a little bit.]

Not quite. But I will leave this offer open. We are... friends, after all. Friends share things, don't they?

[They turn to stare up at the ceiling. All this time they were feeling things going on and on. Things from the past. Although again, it wasn't truly their own fear that Chara was feeling because this

wasn't a good

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I will be leaving shortly.

[They'll leave it up to Sans if he wants to follow or not.]

[skelebro]

"Friends" is a pretty strong word.

[He's not sure what he'd call the pair of them. Enemies by default, maybe? By circumstance? They're not about to go at each other's throats at the first chance they get, but that's hardly a ringing endorsement of anyone's friendship.]

Tired of fear, are we?

[somuchlove]

[Frenemies?! No, no, definitely not.]

Yes. I'd like to see the others. And then there is the outside.

[Spooky mist and creatures. They'd fit right up there with a demon. Chara can't get EXP or LOVE from them but it's still fun to fight them. Another new, shiny challenge.]