aftr_ooc | TEST DRIVE MEME ( 001 )

Test Drive Meme #1

Hello, and welcome to our very first test drive! 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 July 17th and that Applications will open on July 24th, in preparation for the game’s official opening on August 3rd!

But first, two important notes!

1. The island of Mu 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.

Shipwrecked
The white sand of the beach ridges the island’s edge, even if the clear water soon becomes murky the further out you look across the horizon until the turquoise gleam of the tide disappears in a coil of surrounding fog. Indeed, your best prospects may very well be to strike out among the trees or the crags looming out over the foam-capped waves. There’s lumber to be found and made from the palm-like trees, potentially fruit or edible tubers of some kind if you forage about some. The further you travel, however, the more of your surroundings will reveal themselves in a steady unspooling of curiosities.

One corner of Mu’s current construct drops away into a sheer cliff, initially too dangerous to brave for all but the more daredevilish, but if one starts to scan the sharp rocks below, you might catch sight of what appears to be sodden planks of wood - a wreckage tossed up against the rocks. And a little further...a bobbing, shattered wreck of a lifeboat’s remains, potentially bearing supplies that might yet be salvageable.

Fashion what you can from the wood and stone around you or scavenge from the ruin of the land, if you like. But you can’t simply stand around and wait forever. It’s going to get dark sometime - and if a creature of unknown terror doesn’t catch you, the elements surely will.

Storytime

There’s a sense of camaraderie in this cove, you think. As the sun hangs low over the horizon, the world cast into orange hues, long shadows dispersed by roaring fires that dot across the beach.

That’s right, folks: it’s storytime.

There’s no one to preside over this meeting of the minds in Mu. Call it a vague recreation of things to come, if you like, some vaguely fatidic dreamlike state where you may find yourself drawn to the heat and company that awaits you by the fire. And from there, compelled to default to that old instinct that most of intelligent civilization has revered since they were advanced enough to paint geometric shapes on cave walls.

You tell a story.

Perhaps it’s a tragedy, a tale of woe and of personal loss. Perhaps it’s the sort of thing you’d break out after a few rounds of your alcoholic beverage of choice, clapping hands to your knees as you try to bite back your mirth long enough to spill the punchline. Perhaps it’s an adventure of some sort, some unbelievable rendition of your past exploits. The only common thread to be had, as those gathered around the fire share their tales, is the fundamental rule of a ritualistic sharing of stories such as this: its truth.

But how one chooses to define "truth" is, in its own way, another story entirely...

Dance, Sucker, Dance!
The beat of your heart in your chest is difficult to ignore. It judders with a pulsing, rhythmic quality. If you’re one of those that lacks a heart, the beat is still omnipresent and all-encompassing, until your entire body is unwittingly bobbing in time to a metronomic tune that seems ingrained into your very soul. It’s inescapable. You can’t seem to move unless it’s in time to the rhythm that’s now singing in every atom of your being.

But rest assured, you’re not alone in this musical curse. Everything, from the swaying trees to the waves against the beach, jumps in time to the music. And so do the monsters approaching you, that - wait a minute.

Monsters?

Oh, yes. Did we mention those?

It seems you’ve encountered the wrath of the Boogieman, who curses you to only dance to his infernal beat. If you wish to best him, you’ll have to either evade or destroy the blobs of greenish slime that serve as his minions, all in time to the hard beat of the tune in your head. Clear the radius of his curse or risk an open confrontation, if you dare. Don’t worry if you look foolish; chances are anyone else caught in the Boogieman’s thrall feels just the same.

Mu isn’t pulling any punches to start with. It is a flighty creation, after all, and seems to revel in displacing people into new and uncomfortable situations.

LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Itchy-mats, huh?" What a name. But hey, who's he to judge? "Never really thought about where I'd rather kick it, always figured it'd take me by surprise, or something."

Which is Sans's way of answering that other question. While he waits for Ichimatsu to put two and two together, Sans takes personal stock of, uh, himself. The dull headache he recalls having for a long while is gone, and there's something else, something a little more recent. His bones don't itch the way he remembers they did, in both a diffuse and, uh, kinda painful way, in those moments before the world around him began to fragment and dim.

Scrutinizing the sky, the sea, the strand of sand gleaming under the sun in this protected cove, Sans can see no sign of those ailments. The soul's a mysterious thing, even for monsters who spent some resources studying them. Maybe it invents one last beautiful moment for itself, like a consolation prize, once it's all over.

Hell if he knows. But he ain't gonna go questioning a pleasant surprise, either.

Maybe he isn't inclined to wait for him to get the clue, maybe it's time he explained the joke, even: "Anyway, I'm just as alive as you are," for a guy who was convinced this is one last dream as he, uh, dies. "Just a different species. But don't sweat it, pal -- most of your kind mix that up."

"Ichimatsu," he repeats, this time a tad forcefully; he seems annoyed, but not quite offended. As the pause begins to stretch, Ichimatsu reads Sans's silence as an expectant one and decides that he has no idea what the skeleton wants from him. So he's not even going to try. At least dead guys seem to be able to appreciate the quiet more than his loud brothers can.

Or -- a not-dead guy, he realizes as the words finally click. Blinking slowly, Ichimatsu lifts his chin from his crossed arms and studies Sans with renewed curiosity. Then he shrugs. Dead, not dead, a talking skeleton wearing a galaxy-print hoodie is just freaking weird no matter how you cut it. He's more puzzled by Sans's next words than anything else.

"My kind...?" he repeats faintly, his gaze wandering out into the white clouds. After a moment, the meaning seems to fall on him with calm clarity. "Oh, you mean NEETs."

True, as a NEET, he doesn't get out much. Maybe living skeletons are a thing now in America or something.

Edited 2017-07-15 23:59 (UTC)

There's some lengthy silence again from the skeleton, who finally seems to squint his eye sockets at Ichimatsu as he asks:

"What the hell's a NEET?"

.... so that's not what he meant? Well god damn.

"Forget it. Just think 'trash' and you have the same thing." Ichimatsu waves a dismissive hand, maybe a bit too eagerly. "So what the hell are you, then?"

Human garbage meets smiley trashbag. Sans is pretty sure 'neet' means something, and that doesn't sound like self-depreciative humor so much as just plain old self-depreciation. He won't press it, guy seems like he could use all the slack anyone can cut him. Not that he anticipates getting this guy to chuckle at all, but Sans goes with this for the hell of it.

Fine sand trickles off his phalanges as they emerge; he crooks his phalanges at Ichimatsu, like the claws he lacks, as he continues to grin at him. "A monster." Yeah, no, he doesn't look at all scary. Just... slightly ridiculous. Also holding up his hands gets old fast, so he drops them into his lap.

It isn't quite a laugh, to be sure, but a snort breaks free from Ichimatsu's throat before he can stop it. It's probably falling on the side of rude, the way he scans Sans up and down like he's studying a door mouse with overgrown fangs. Is this weirdo just insulting himself, or is that legitimately what he's classifying himself as? With a grin like that, Ichimatsu can't tell... for a guy without any skin or muscles, he has a real smug look about him. It's actually sort of irritating.

Not enough for Ichimatsu to hate the guy yet, though. He seems pretty unthreatening.

"Not buying it," he says bluntly. "My brother is what you'd call a monster. A dry one. I dunno about you."

"Nah, I'd call him human," drones the skeleton, half turning to scoop at the sand, heaping it together until he's got a roughly Sans-appropriate pillow to recline back against, which he promptly does. "It's only your kind that thinks monster's an insult," concludes Sans, shifting down, getting comfortable.

Stretching out leaves half a bony leg out in the sun. He nudges off one dustmop slipper to flex his toes -- phalanges, whatever -- against the crystalline grit. Ok, yeah, he could definitely nap here.

"We've been livin' underground for ages, buddy." So... he doesn't have to buy it. "Gonna go out on a limb and say you and your bro don't get along."

Ichimatsu's eyes narrow. Is this guy lecturing him...? You're kidding. Worse, Ichimatsu does feel a little bit chastened. He decides not to think too hard about it -- it's not as if some random skeleton has the right to go around telling him how to think of his brother.

When he outright asks, though, Ichimatsu's patchy eyebrows tick upward. Okay, yeah... anyone would make the assumption he doesn't like Totty when he says things like that. As much of a pain in the ass Todomatsu is, he's still Ichimatsu's little brother, which makes him more tolerable than the older half of the sextuplets by default. He shouldn't give Sans the wrong idea.

"Ah... it's not that we don't get along. It's just... " He pauses, scratches at his jawline. "... he's more capable than the rest of us. More clever, too."

If Ichimatsu is upselling his brother from a sense of inflated pride or even distaste, he doesn't show it. His words are blunt and academic.

"You'd better watch yourself if you run into him. He acts clueless, but he isn't."

TEST DRIVE MEME ( 001 )

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