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redmarsshit2019-12-24 10:36 pm
modblob) wrote in redmarsshit2019-12-24 10:36 pm
test drive meme: december 2019
Redshift: Welcome to the v͖͕̺̲̘̱̜͎o̴̦̣̠̦̘̹͞i̯̖d̛̪̬͈̱̦̝͍̕.
▶ Click here to read what characters will experience when arriving in Anchor.
▶ All TDM threads can be considered game canon, and current players are welcome to either top-level on the TDM so prospective players can tag them, or use the prompts for logs or network posts on the communities. All threads on the TDM can be used for Activity Check.
▶ All TDM threads can be considered game canon, and current players are welcome to either top-level on the TDM so prospective players can tag them, or use the prompts for logs or network posts on the communities. All threads on the TDM can be used for Activity Check.
a. santapocalypse.
As the suns set over the unforgiving landscape around Anchor, a bright light flares in the sky, streaking low and fast across the horizon, throwing off flares of green, white, and red.
The impact...is not explosive. Just another flare of light, and then smoke to mark where the object went down. Whatever it was, it didn't come from the redshift. It came from within the planet's atmosphere, such as it is, and landed barely a few steps outside the city.
Characters who choose to investigate will find something strange at the bottom of the pillar of smoke. They'll find a small ship, one that seems to have been cobbled together with pieces of a dozen different ships from a dozen different universes. The cockpit is busted wide open, a red jacket caught on a piece of glass, with no other sign of the pilot. Except for, y'know, the red ringing the broken glass, but we'll just ignore that, shall we?
Scattered all around the vehicle, some of them scorched on the outside but otherwise unharmed, are boxes, boxes, boxes. None are bigger than a shoebox, and all wrapped beautifully with bows on top. Characters who start opening them will find box after box containing nonsense items that might be valuable to someone, but maybe not anyone here. But if they open enough, eventually they'll find something inside that could only be intended for them, it’s so specific, odd, or precious. Any other box they open after that will be empty.
Those that dare enter will find the ship appears larger on the inside. And it also seems to be mostly made of hallways. Hallways that lead nowhere, hallways that, from time to time, are filled with an ominous...jingling.
The source of that jingling is the reindire.
Twisted, monstrous creatures with talons in place of hooves, they will hunt whoever enters the ship through its halls and even back across the wasteland should characters attempt to run. Most of them can be calmed, even tamed. Eaten, if hunting for venison is your character's jam (have at, SSSSs).
Only one cannot be reasoned with, or easily defeated.
The largest of all the reindire, one with fangs and wings and a lust for blood. And a big red nose that shoots lasers. You wouldn't want it following you back to Anchor, would you? Best to defeat it out in the sands, where it can't do any real harm.
The impact...is not explosive. Just another flare of light, and then smoke to mark where the object went down. Whatever it was, it didn't come from the redshift. It came from within the planet's atmosphere, such as it is, and landed barely a few steps outside the city.
Characters who choose to investigate will find something strange at the bottom of the pillar of smoke. They'll find a small ship, one that seems to have been cobbled together with pieces of a dozen different ships from a dozen different universes. The cockpit is busted wide open, a red jacket caught on a piece of glass, with no other sign of the pilot. Except for, y'know, the red ringing the broken glass, but we'll just ignore that, shall we?
Scattered all around the vehicle, some of them scorched on the outside but otherwise unharmed, are boxes, boxes, boxes. None are bigger than a shoebox, and all wrapped beautifully with bows on top. Characters who start opening them will find box after box containing nonsense items that might be valuable to someone, but maybe not anyone here. But if they open enough, eventually they'll find something inside that could only be intended for them, it’s so specific, odd, or precious. Any other box they open after that will be empty.
Those that dare enter will find the ship appears larger on the inside. And it also seems to be mostly made of hallways. Hallways that lead nowhere, hallways that, from time to time, are filled with an ominous...jingling.
The source of that jingling is the reindire.
Twisted, monstrous creatures with talons in place of hooves, they will hunt whoever enters the ship through its halls and even back across the wasteland should characters attempt to run. Most of them can be calmed, even tamed. Eaten, if hunting for venison is your character's jam (have at, SSSSs).
Only one cannot be reasoned with, or easily defeated.
The largest of all the reindire, one with fangs and wings and a lust for blood. And a big red nose that shoots lasers. You wouldn't want it following you back to Anchor, would you? Best to defeat it out in the sands, where it can't do any real harm.
b. keep calm & carry on.
As characters have worked on improving the city, they've knocked a few loose screws back into place and rewired a few polarities that needed reversing and now, a new area has opened up. It announces itself with a loud screech as the bulkheads that kept it blocked off open up. The new space is huge, at first seemingly empty.
This space does what the VR rooms can't. It reads minds.
It won't show scenes from home, no, but it will create a facsimile of a place that your character would find most relaxing. And this isn't the simple visual experience of the VR rooms. This is full-sensory immersion. Characters will see, yes, but also be able to touch, smell, even taste what's on the air in their surroundings. If there is fruit, they can pick and eat it - it won't satisfy them, but they'll be able to taste what's there. If there's water, they'll be able to swim it in, and will even feel wet until they climb back onto the shore or out of the pool.
Some lucky souls will even get Anchor's therapy AI chiming in to their scenes, with suggestions like, "Talk to your anxiety the way you would to a friend. Ask it where it comes from, see what it’s doing for you, and redirect it into healthy self-expression." Or, "Have you tried yoga?" or, occasionally, "I think you really really need a nap."
The focus of the room is to help characters relax. Those rolling blackouts that have been happening around Anchor ever since the room opened up? They’re probably nothing to worry about. Right?
This space does what the VR rooms can't. It reads minds.
It won't show scenes from home, no, but it will create a facsimile of a place that your character would find most relaxing. And this isn't the simple visual experience of the VR rooms. This is full-sensory immersion. Characters will see, yes, but also be able to touch, smell, even taste what's on the air in their surroundings. If there is fruit, they can pick and eat it - it won't satisfy them, but they'll be able to taste what's there. If there's water, they'll be able to swim it in, and will even feel wet until they climb back onto the shore or out of the pool.
Some lucky souls will even get Anchor's therapy AI chiming in to their scenes, with suggestions like, "Talk to your anxiety the way you would to a friend. Ask it where it comes from, see what it’s doing for you, and redirect it into healthy self-expression." Or, "Have you tried yoga?" or, occasionally, "I think you really really need a nap."
The focus of the room is to help characters relax. Those rolling blackouts that have been happening around Anchor ever since the room opened up? They’re probably nothing to worry about. Right?
c. the network.
Need to get hold of someone, call for help, ask the city at large a question? Need to ask a friend to back you up on the reindire hunt? Maybe you need to hold your sat phone up to whatever crazy thing you're seeing and send out a recording to double-check if your eyes are deceiving you and what you're looking at is real?
Whatever the reason, the network is going strong, so feel free to include a post to it in your top-levels.
Whatever the reason, the network is going strong, so feel free to include a post to it in your top-levels.
no subject
"Synthetic is a new word for it." She's never heard it put that way. Then again, there were a lot of rules put in place about what could and could not be done to a machine with intelligence.
So there she hovers, "robots are just like people. They're not better or worse than anyone else."
no subject
Maybe it's more information than she ought to give to someone she doesn't know, but Rey doesn't make an effort to hide who and what she is unless it comes up. And now she can't help but find it crawling out of the abyss of things she's avoided thinking too much about since she got here, if only because not many of the people she's spoken to would understand a word of it.
Someone talking like robots are just like people, though? That's a dangerous line of thinking, or so she's always believed.
no subject
Angel shifts her hand, touching the walls still, "take it from me, my whole purpose until I died, was manipulating and using people - robotic and flesh and blood." The truth is offered in kind. Not to belittle, her tone still soft, still giving. Because this woman didn't seem like she wanted to share these things about herself. Clearly - it was something hard to know.
"Here, I think this room can show you who I used to be. Can't you?" She turns her eyes upwards again, coaxing now along with it. Facing this part of her life was becoming easier, with time. "Excuse me, AI, can you show me my mental file labelled 5672? Control Core memory regarding the Vault Hunters, Lilith, Brick, Mordecai and Roland?"
"Of course. Are you sure? You seem very sad about them."
Angel nods. "It's alright. I don't mind, it's important to help."
no subject
These aren't things she says aloud this time, though. Her tongue feels thick and heavy, and her teeth clenching her jaw shut, locked tight as she studies the woman. If she didn't know any better, she would wonder if this person was synthetic, herself. But no, she speaks too like-human, has too much the compassion of one. Despite her odd appearance, it's not something even the synthetics Rey has contended with would ever reveal themselves.
"You really don't have to, you know." Rey doesn't say it, but the implication is there -- painted in various ways on face and voice.
I'm not worth it.
no subject
The room around them changes again, from the wood of the tall ships cabin. To a metal and light filled room. A far different time and place, of technology that far out stripped even Anchor, and with it, Angel changes. Back to something more human, even if the blue tattoos on her left hand side stay - she takes flight, two huge and white powerful wings of light that suspend her from the ground. Unearthly but still human, she hovers.
But that isn't what she wants to show her companion as she lifts a hand to beckon her.
"Come here. I can't hurt you like this."
no subject
For a moment she inclines her head to just stare at the now-winged woman, eyes widened as she retreats a step. This is exactly the kind of thing that she was afraid of when she first came here -- the possibility that none of this is real. That it's all just a simulation put into her mind by IV, in some sick and twisted method of torture to wriggle her way into Rey's brain.
Against her better judgement, she moves forward instead, drawn by curiosity and the beckoning gesture.
"What are you doing?"
This isn't just the AI in this room, is it?
no subject
She shrugs, unending in her calm, her removal, her soft tone. Coaxing like a guide, a friendly hand on the shoulder.
"I understand you're scared of the technology, but don't be in this scenario. I was given powers, once that meant I manipulated technology by my sheer thoughts alone."
no subject
Save for maybe the AI in this room, which Rey does everything she can to try and shut it out of her own cybernetic brain. Her father may be a flawed man, may be the cause of the state of the world as it is, but Lucas Coffey has centuries of experience with technology to have safely secured that part of Rey's cerebral coding from third party interference. It should be safe. Should be...
"It's not the technology itself. Hell, am part of that technology," she continues, deciding that she at least owes some examination. "It's what someone intends to do with that technology. Use it to control people. Control you. Make you do whatever they want, even things you never wanted to do." Her jaw tightens, fingers clench, nails dig into her sides and she seethes between her biting teeth as she forces herself to admit: "There is nothing worse than being a prisoner inside your own body."
It'd been that way for most of her lives. It should be different, but she can't help but worry that there might be a vulnerability that can be exploited someday. That she'd have been better off dead than to take that risk.
no subject
"Then technology never had anything to do with it. It's just like people. It just is. I did the things you're afraid. Technology helped, but not really. I got into their heads, and I did it with only my voice, I got them to do terrible things."
Witb, and this the greatest of all sins - love. "That isn't technologies affliction, that is the measure of a person. Toold are tools, it's who we are when we hold them that matters."