TEST DRIVE MEME ( 020 )

[lifeaftr_mods]

Test Drive Meme #20

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.

Due to the shortness of the month, both Reserves AND Applications will open on February 17th!

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.

Hell's Fury Burns the Heart
Back in December, the island of Maati treated travelers to unique Trials, tailored to their own unique sins and vices. Of the seven possible trials for adventurers to undergo, the Trial of the Forgiving, the trial laser-focused to exploit those most predisposed to be wrathful and violent, was among the simplest. Unlike the other trials, there were very few puzzles and mazes. The Trial of the Forgiving was largely, in essence, a trial of temptation.

This Trial takes the shape of a stone-walled spiral, with trial-goers starting at the outermost point and working their way steadily to the exit at the center. The torches lining the hall as it stretches infinitely onward paints the walls with a warm amber tint, giving the entire place a much more welcoming ambiance than will eventually become evident.

Your task is simple: make it to the end in one piece. All you have to do is withstand the constant harassment from the very, very familiar faces that will stalk you throughout the entirety of this gauntlet. Each specter that appears will be one with which you hold a significant grievance - be it a personal antagonist, a long-standing nemesis, a foe you once faced, or even yourself, if your self-hatred runs that deep. All the while, they'll be doing their utmost to incite you to strike at them. Taunting you, acting out, threatening you or the ones you love; while they cannot physically harm you, they don't necessarily need to, in order to strike a nerve.

They want you to attack them. They want you to lash out. In part because all damage you attempt to deal to them will be rebounded back onto you - and whoever might be accompanying you - instead. A poorly-timed attack or well-placed insult might very well be enough to one-shot you, or your companions, into oblivion.

It's a good thing you have, potentially, innumerable chances. Every time you're struck down, you'll simply reappear at the very start of the Trial...and have to start making your way to the end all over again.

The Weakest Link
Once again, Mu has reformatted one of Maati's Trials for its own purposes. This one is based off of the Trial of the Trusting, which focused on building bonds and connections between its victi - er, between its trial-goers. For those prone to paranoia, distrust, or simply being emotionally closed off, this would be the challenge laid out to them: a sequence of puzzles and traps requiring teamwork and faith in one another, at least in the situational sense.

Fortunately - or, perhaps, unfortunately - things here are going to be a little simpler, though you'll still be waking in a tunnel lined with dark green stone, intermittently lit by the odd, irregularly spaced torch. This Trial will make its intentions quite clear from the beginning, for, you see, you're going to be waking up with a friend.

One that happens to be chained, that is. To you. A length of about two feet of chain links the cuffs that bind you, one wrist to another, with whatever other unlucky soul has woken up here beside you. No matter what you do to said chain, it remains stubbornly indestructible. Though you could always try breaking your wrists, or severing your hands instead, or...actually, you know what? Why don't you just try to get through the Trial with your new friend, instead? It's probably going to be at least marginally less painful!

The path that is open to the pair of you is fairly linear. Its difficulty largely stems from the back that you'll be traversing it as a permanently linked pair. Obstacles present will always be surmountable as a team - switches and levers that might involve two people to reach, doors that require dual switches or buttons to be held down, puzzles that require passing of information between the both of you to expedite progress, and so on. There's also the matter of the Rarriers - ogre-like creatures of large stature and a territorial nature. Those under the keen gaze of a Rarrier will find them impossible to attack; their front hide is as tough as steel, and attacks tend to simply glance off. Their backs and sides are of a much more vulnerable nature, however. If only you could reach...or get someone else to do it for you.

Assuming you're not both sick of each other by the time you reach the exit, you'll be rewarded with the breaking of the cuffs that connect you, symbolizing that a friendship forged is stronger than any iron! Though, by the end...maybe "friendship" isn't the word we'd use.

Well Met
This place is hot, dry, and arid - but at least it's brightly lit! The peach-colored swell of dunes seems to be limitless, in nearly every direction, with the stretch of sand fading seemingly infinitely into the dark, purple line of the horizon. The sun overhead is relentless and sweltering; if you're the sort of person who needs to self-regulate, temperature wise, you might be in for a bit of a problem the longer you're stuck out here. Could be a rough time.

Fortunately for you, there's water. Very nearby, in fact. It's the only deviation from the sea of sand: a dark, circular blot that looks very, very much like a water well. As the only landmark in the vicinity, it seems at the very least worth checking out, right? The closer you get, the less it seems like it might be a mirage, or some other elaborate ruse. It looks like a perfectly normal, unassuming well. Which is why, of course, it isn't one at all.

Well mimics are native to the island of Monsun, and they're...well, they're exactly what they sound like. They favor dry, desert-like environments, and hunt by luring travelers and animals alike to the temptingly fresh waters they hold. Mu has been helpful enough to recreate one in vivid detail, just for you.

These creatures are largely tube-shaped animals, buried deep in the sandy earth. They suction fresh water from deep within the earth and hold it in the lowermost parts of themselves. The simple construct that travelers see - the circular, stone shape with the rope and bucket for hauling water - is, in fact, their mouth, carefully adapted to camouflage itself into something that seems perfectly serviceable. Once travelers attempt to grab hold of the rope or bucket, or even the rim of the well itself, they'll discover that the surfaces have all been slicked with a sticky substance that may very well take off a layer of your skin if you attempt to tear away without taking great care.

Once the well mimic has entrapped its prey, the "well" sprouts teeth around its stone rim, lining its rocky gullet all the way to the bottom, as well as a fat red tongue. Rope-like tentacles whip out to seize whatever poor soul has found themselves ensnared. If you don't manage to get free in time, you'll learn just how it feels to be digested over a period of twenty-four hours while your body is broken down into a squishy, delicious mulch for the mimic's consumption.

The best way to kill these creatures is by tricking it into swallowing something lethal - fire, poison, sharp weapons, whatever you have on hand. Well mimics are quite blind and hunt purely by touch, and will seize whatever touches them without any knowledge of what it is. And once it has one victim in hand, it's quite incapable of grabbing hold of another.

---

LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Comments

👀👀👀👀👀 YOU JUST MADE MY ENTIRE MONTH,

[counterblows]

[The helmet contains his wince but does nothing to hide the way his shoulders tense up slightly in response to one of the many, many questions he never wanted to hear asked. A slow intake of breath, and he tunnels his focus forward, forward, to parsing the looming tunnelspace in front of them, as if that would make him any less hyper-aware of Maine's size and bulk literally about one foot away from.]

Yeah. Yeah, I do.

[His tone is impressively measured, considering how badly it feels it should shake.]

If you're ready to hear something weird, it was actually several months ago. Something like seven, eight months.

😁 💙

[bloodbathing]

[ The stiffening of Wash's shoulders is something Maine notices, catching it in his peripheral vision, but it doesn't set off warning bells. Maybe Wash has a gap in his memory as well. Maybe Wash only just noticed it, and he's tensing at the realization.

... Or maybe it's something else altogether.

Maine's head jerks slightly, visibly taken aback. Then he turns to stare down at his friend, eyes wide behind his visor.

Seven or eight months? How the fuck is that possible? They were on a mission together before ... whatever happened to bring them here. How could Wash have been here for months?

Rather than tackling the "how" immediately, Maine uses his free hand to gesture at their surroundings:

"Here?"

Wash has been stuck in this weird stone place for months? ]

[counterblows]

Not here, specifically. [Here it comes. The long line of explanations he doesn't want to embark on. The part where you're dead and but you didn't just die and it's been years and I'm not who I was and a million other things that he thought he could shake but can't, in the end. Memory is the rope always around his neck, drawing tighter.]

[It's like C.T. slid something into the carefully compartmentalized parts of himself and sent it all tumbling down, all over again.]

But...the here where this is. I mean, we're not where we were. The mission. The Sarcophagus.

[Sentence fragments, loose pieces of information. It's like jostling a bucket full of screws and hoping that one of them jimmies in where it's supposed to, but he can feel the buildup in the back of his throat, his own infuriating vagueness grueling and acid.]

It hasn't...I haven't been there in a while.

[bloodbathing]

[ Fragmented sentences are something that Maine can work with. Shit, they're practically all the big Freelancer uses when he speaks. Complete sentences are for when the situation is serious, or for when there can be no room for misunderstandings. Otherwise, Maine uses as few words as possible, valuing brevity and bluntness over damn near everything.

But hearing the short, stilted fragments coming out of Wash is different. It means that something's wrong. If there were any doubt in Maine's mind that Wash is telling the truth, it vanishes as he listens to his friend stumble over his words. Maine doesn't know how it's possible — but he trusts Wash.

"Shit."

Breathed out in a hiss between his teeth. The sort of thing that would sound like nothing but noise to strangers. To Wash, it'll likely sound dumbfounded.

After another moment spent staring at his teammate, Maine returns his gaze to the path ahead. Moves in silence for a moment, letting the information settle in his mind. Then: ]

You been safe?

[ Does he need to hunt anyone down and break their neck? ]

[counterblows]

Yeah.

[Not really. He's definitely died a few times, but none of them stuck, and that's what he gets for getting stuck in a Trial with a fucking superpowered antichrist with a grudge ten miles long. But he answers immediately, because he's still alive and he's not more or less fucked up than usual, he thinks, though his metric for his own degree of sanity is admittedly a bit skewed at this point.]

[But he doesn't need anyone getting snapped in two over it.]

Safe as I can be, in a place like this. Things like this...happen...often, it turns out.

[good solid explanation wash 10/10]

[bloodbathing]

[ Satisfied with the immediate response, Maine turns his thoughts away from potential neck-breaking. At least until he figures out who (or what) is responsible for bringing them here. Might have to hold off then, too, until he figures out how the fuck to get Wash and himself home. But the eventual violence is oddly soothing to contemplate. Nothing quite beats having a goal in mind.

... A goal that isn't just wandering down a stone corridor, that is.

Maine grunts quietly — "irritating" — at the thought of this sort of thing happening often. Once has been enough for him, and they've only run across one obstacle so far. It doesn't look like their luck with obstacles will last for much longer, though.

The path they're on slopes down, and the ceiling rises. Up ahead, there's a sheer wall that appears completely solid save for a gap near the top. The hole looks like it's big enough for them to fit through, provided they can reach it; it's well above Maine's head, and he'd need a running start just to catch the edge. ]

[counterblows]

You got that right.

[He should be alarmed, maybe, at how easily he falls into the pattern of it, reading the words that Maine says without really saying them. Only he never needed instruction to decode the Meta's body language, either - ]

[He wrenches the thought in two before it can develop any further. Focus on the task at hand, Agent. He was good at that. Good at showing up with his orders and an assault rifle and doing his goddamn job without any distractions, or personal hang-ups, or fits of competitive frenzy.]

All right, what've we got here? I don't think we can stand on each other's shoulders when we're linked like this.

[bloodbathing]

[ Maine gives a low rumble of agreement. Sitting on shoulders, maybe, but not standing — and it's not like their armor would make such a thing easy. He eyes the ledge, mentally calculating how much force it would take to reach it. Tries to figure out if he could manage it at all, much less while chained to Wash.

Maybe he could somehow fling Wash mid-jump...? He makes a face and brushes that option aside; he doesn't want to throw his friend around.

Instead, Maine (somewhat grudgingly) looks for something that doesn't require brute strength. Some sign of handholds in the stone, or cracks they could dig their fingers into — or shit, maybe a fucking ladder. ]

[counterblows]

Running head start, maybe?

[It's a style of thinking lateral to his own, to Maine's; he'd say that they both prefer relatively simple routes to complex problems, though their styles will vary. He starts checking for handholds himself, considers how likely that he'd be able to gouge something into the stone with the butt of a gun or a knife, but the rock seems more or less solid.]

It's not that big of a jump. [It's not a skyscraper, for one.] We'd just have to be really, really in sync.

[Wouldn't be a problem, if Wash were from the point in time he's been implying he's from. But now?]

[bloodbathing]

[ Being in sync with his friend is something that Maine considers to be no problem at all. He's good at working in tandem with his teammates — when he's not blatantly ignoring them or too filled with fury to give a shit, that is. If Wash thinks he can make the jump, Maine's willing to give it a shot.

So the big man nods, and nothing in his body language shows a sliver of doubt. Starts backing up so that they can get the running head start Wash suggested. When they're at a suitable distance, Maine looks down at the other Freelancer. ]

Sync?

[counterblows]

[Adrenaline gathering in the pit of his stomach, the tang of anticipated failure sticking in his throat. It's floodgates, minutes away from crashing open and making it bitterly apparent that too much time has passed for Wash to simply back into step with an old teammate deemed dead rogue and worse more times than should be feasible.]

[Contemplate committing this to memory, in case this is real, in case it's the last time he ever sees him. Contemplate it, but decide against it, because memory is a sieve, reliable only in its unreliability.]

[He's certain the failure will be his. It'll have to be. If the last thing Maine remembers is the mission, would it occur to him that his old teammates might be scared of him when he isn't even aware that they are, in fact, old teammates?]

[But he manages it: a low whisper, a fractional nod.]

Sync.

[Here we go.]

[bloodbathing]

[ The thought that Wash might be scared of him would never cross Maine's mind. Sure, Wash may have seemed a bit ... unsettled after the match against Texas. May have stared at him a bit overlong when they were both assigned to Team A shortly after. But Wash being afraid of him? Maine can't imagine it.

So Maine offers no additional reassurance. Just nods and — trusting in their teamwork — takes off towards the wall.

He has no way of knowing how similar the moment is to one that took place on Sidewinder. No way of knowing that the Meta leaped for the ice wall with Brute Shot in hand, leaving Wash to his fate. ]

[counterblows]

[It's the raw and painful similarity that arrests him - the echoes of a partnership that catches him unawares and reminds him, achingly, of Sidewinder. He gets a half a second of frozen time, suspended in the air, to realize it.]

[Some part of him, unconscious, must have caught the similarity before he was aware of it. He's a fraction too slow. A split second of hesitation puts him just a half a pace behind Maine, jarring their synchronization.]

[He's not fast enough. He springs, and it's seconds too slow.]