aftr_ooc | TEST DRIVE MEME ( 007 )

Test Drive Meme #7

Hello, and welcome to LifeAftr! We’re pleased that you’re expressing an interest in the game. Here, you can test the waters, gauge how your character may fare in the world of LifeAftr, and even gain some in-game incentives, if you so choose.

Remember that Reserves will open on January 15th, and Applications on January 24th!

Two important notes:

1. LifeAftr's test drives take place on the island of Mu, which exists apart from the real world and possesses a dream-like quality that characters are innately aware of from the moment they appear on its shores. No need to panic or fret. Dreams are odd things, after all - and anything can happen in them. Why would anyone question where their mind chooses to wander in its sleep?

2. Due to the nature of Mu, threads in our test drive can not only be accepted as thread samples in your application, but can be accepted as game canon as well. In fact, certain choices your character makes in Mu have the potential to bear in-game consequences, largely in the form of test drive reward items.

Ice of You to Drop By
The winter has well and truly settled in, both on LifeAftr and here in Mu; when you wake, you may discover that it isn't on dry land at all, but on a thick crust of ice. In fact, there doesn't seem to be any land in sight, in any direction - just ice, stretching on and on for as far as the eye can see.

Assuming the chill doesn't get to you first, you'll find that there are much more pressing matters than frostbite. One of those things will start cutting to the chase rather quickly in the form of a wickedly pointed fin, glinting beneath the weak winter sun, shearing through the mantle of ice like a hot knife through butter.

Ice sharks sound like something out of a sci-fi B-movie and probably are something out of a sci-fi B-movie, but rest assured: they are still quite dangerous. Fragments of undersea ice animated to suit a particularly sadistic shape and size, ice sharks almost look like delicately worked sculptures of glass or diamond, right up until the point where one of them gets their jaws around you. Their preternatural strength and tenacity allows them to "swim" through ice as easily as water. In fact, that happens to be one of their hunting tactics, as they tend to circle a target and break at the ice around them until they're surrounded by icy water, with no means of escape.

Much like real sharks, they can smell blood, and will set upon it eagerly. Unlike real sharks, they are also innately hostile. Anyone who looks like they might be an easy target will be quickly zeroed in upon by several ravenous, but nonetheless quite pretty, of these glittering creatures.

With Our Wassailing Bowl
The rest of Mu might be more forgiving in terms of setting, but that does not mean you're safe. Waking on dry land is generally considered preferable to waking on nothing more than a layer of ice, even if said dry land is nothing more than a jagged spurt of dark, coastal cliff. It's obvious from the start that nothing truly lives here. The island itself is simply some fragment of rock, eroded away from its mainland until it is all that remains.

The island itself isn't special, no. What is special is what is at its center.

A massive clay pot of piping-hot wassail steams temptingly at the island's heart, nestled between the crags of rock. Just looking at it, you can know that drinking that heated, blissful drink of cider and cinnamon will surely chase away the unforgiving winter chill, and warm you from your bones to your toes.

Really, the only problem here is that everyone else wants it too.

The second you lay eyes on that treasure, you'll be seized with an instinctive, inescapable need to have it. No one else can be allowed to partake; it is yours by right. You saw it first, after all, didn't you? You'll have to race with your peers to seize it before anyone else does, and you might even have to start fighting dirty to claim your prize. Sure, you could fight that initial instinct, but where's the fun in that?

Dig a Little Deeper
It's not as though actual, real dry land is out of the question for Mu this go around. It's just that there aren't very many desirable options, evidently, when it comes to the manner of islands that resemble those in the proper archipelago. This island in question might be a bit cold, brisk as the winter air is, but it is otherwise quite ordinary. In fact, one would not be remiss in thinking it bears more than a passing resemblance to the island of Chol.

Unfortunately, it's also chosen to emulate a rather unpleasant, if rare, aspect of Chol's landscape: quicksand. No getting out of this one, we're afraid - Mu has dropped you right smack in the middle of a patch of it.

The myth that one can "drown" in quicksand is largely without much scientific bearing. Indeed, the most prominent danger is that one will start to sink and quickly become mired in the stuff, but eventually they'll cease to properly sink at all. No; the real peril lies in the fact that, once stuck, it is nearly impossible to get out of it. Most victims of quicksand risk death by dehydration or starvation, though we wouldn't fault you for fearing death by, er, sand. Who doesn't hate sand? It's coarse, it's rough, it's irritating, and it gets everywhere.

There doesn't seem to be much in the way of ropes or branches one might grab onto for purchase, once stuck. You'll have to ask passersby for a helping hand, and hope they're feeling charitable...or just drag them in with you, if you're that sort of person.

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( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

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He'd saved her too.

Aside from a slightly sore shoulder and a couple of scrapes from the fall, she was fine. Better than fine. He was here, her brother was here. For some two months now she'd been alone; everyone on the islands had been wonderful, and kind. But none of them had been with her in the Tower. None of them had endured all that.

None of them were her family.

She didn't even hesitate to hug him back, tightly. He wasn't the only one crying, not by a long shot.

She didn't know for sure if he'd make it from here to the islands proper. Didn't know if coming here was a guarantee. But at least she had this now, this moment.

As Xion began to cry Shion's tears slipped through his closed eyes. He hugged her tightly, for a moment just clinging to her. This dream was unfair. They had said goodbye only moments ago, it had been one of the hardest things he had ever done and now she was here and he never wanted to let her go.

But despite that he couldn't help but be glad, for all the same reasons. If the last two and a half years had taught him anything it was to take moments like this. He couldn't explain how they were in a strange dream, but he could not help but feel thankful that it had given him the chance to hug his sister one last time.

"I'm going to miss you so much." He whispered into her hair.

Wait... miss her.

She pulled back, reluctant as she was to let go anytime soon. "Did... did you not make it back either?"

But she'd been here for two months! The idea of coming from different times was hardly a new one, but the idea of this sort of time... manipulation was... Well, not confusing, but frustrating. A headache that didn't need to be.

Just to confirm, she asked, "What do you remember last?"

A... familiar question. Though probably not one that he's used to having addressed at him. And maybe a hint that this... isn't exactly an ordinary dream.

Make it back? Shion blinked at her as she pulled back. He had not made it back yet but the way Xion said either rang warning bells.

The question... It added to the growing feeling that this dream space was something more than an ordinary dream.

"The machine. Zo climbed onto it... We were going home." His voice was quiet as he thought about it. His theory that this might be a storage effect of the machine was turning into a fear that something had gone wrong with the machine.

"Xion?" Red eyes peered into hers, it was a question, multiple questions. What did she know? What was happening?

Well, at least she didn't have to think about if it was possible for people to come from different time points within the Tower. That it might be possible for someone to tug them out of Zo's hold. She smiled weakly, mostly relieved but nervous too.

"Remember how there were other places like the Tower? Like... like Hinoto-Ri, and some people came from other cities or facilities or... things like that," she asked. "Well... we're sort of in one now. Someone must've grabbed us while Zo was sending us home. We don't know who or what yet. But... so far you and I are the only ones from the Tower here."

Shion nodded, he remembered the visitors from Hinoto-Ri. The strange group that had appeared altogether from the same place, from a world that had not been destroyed.

They had known about other places. Places that Shion assumed were controlled by others just as powerful as Zo, as Ruana.

He hadn't thought of it. They hadn't even figured it in to their plans. Had not stopped to contemplate that someone else might grab their souls... If Xion was here and he was... where was everyone else? Had anyone got home? Had everything been for nothing?

Anger was growing in him, but there was nothing to fight, nothing to focus his anger on. He had no idea about anything. He reached out, grabbing Xion's hand, she was here. It was alright. Breathing.

"This place doesn't feel real." The tower had not been real, not in the way they had thought it was. But this was a dream... "How do you know?"

"I've been there for about a month and a half now," she explained, squeezing his hand back, "This place is sort of... on the edge, I think? A lot of people come here before they actually get to the islands."

At least, she hoped they all would go to the islands next. She knew that she herself had but at the same time... she didn't want to get her hopes up overly much. Didn't want that hope to be taken away again. (Honestly she was fighting a losing battle on that first count).

"It's... a lot nicer than the Tower, at least. We mostly have to take care of ourselves but... It's not as dangerous."

A month and a half... A month and a half since they had said goodbye. No... this had to be some strange dream. It had to be. Because he had not gone home and they had been together moments ago...

Perhaps I will end up going and liberating another Tower and asking the Zo there to help me. Diarmuid's joke. Was this another universe? Another Xion who knew him? Was there hundreds of towers? Shion's that met Xion's?

It was enough to make his brain hurt but it did not hurt as much as the fact she was here, in this place. The Islands. She had been here for a month and a half. No one else from the tower was here...

He had chosen to go home, to Rat, to rescue Safu. They had fought for that choice. For their future, Xion had fought for her future. Anger flooded him that someone, something, had interrupted that.

"You shouldn't be here..." A note of anger in his voice.

"Hey..." she heard that anger, recognized it. She reached her hands up to cup each side of his face, hopefully to get him to look at her, really look at her. Gently she bumped his forehead with her own.

"It's just a setback, okay? It's just a setback." Please calm down. Please don't get angry on her account. It would be okay. "We'll figure it out. I'm just so glad you're here."

They could be angry later, they'd have plenty of time for it, at this rate. But for now... they needed this. She needed this. She'd missed her friends and family from the Tower so much.

Touch calmed Shion, touch from Xion always calmed him, anger lessened and he breathed looking at her, into her eyes for a moment doing nothing but staring at them, letting himself get lost in the blueness of them. Her forehead bumped hers, he crossed his eyes slightly to keep looking into hers.

It was just a setback, they could figure things out. They had restored hundreds of worlds, they could figure a way out of this. Shion had made the choice to go home, as had Xion. Safu needed him, he had to rescue her. Rat... well he maybe didn't need Shion but Shion still felt like he needed to help him. He had to go home, he didn't want to be stuck in another place.

Still. If Xion was here. If no one else from the Tower was. Xion needed him as well. Not for many things, Shion was the first to admit that his little sister was a thousand times more capable than he was, but Xion should not be alone. Never. Ever. As much as Shion wanted to wish he could be back in his world he couldn't. Not if it knowingly meant leaving Xion.

His hands came up to hug her again, he breathed. "I'm glad I'm here too." In the end he guessed, like so much of their lives they had absolutely no choice in this. All they could do was react, and try to survive as best they could.

TEST DRIVE MEME ( 007 )

Results were inconclusive when I looked at Mu's info so I just went with "Ehhh ¯\_(ツ)_/¯")

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