test drive meme: april 2020

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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.

▶ SPECIAL NOTE: We're only a month off from the 1 year anniversary of the first TDM, and we received this request for a fancy dress ball, so we thought it would be funny fun to run with it! This TDM will only have one prompt/event, as the monthly log with a bit more plot-related stuff will be going up on Friday May 1st.

a. an invitation.

There are ears everywhere in Anchor. A maintenance bot here, a surveillance AI there. SINI, restlessly pacing the dark digital hallways as she watches over the things that still matter to her. It doesn't take long for word to get out about Starscream's expedition plans. It takes an even shorter time for that news to circulate amongst Anchor's robo-population.

They know when you're unhappy. They always know.

It's why residents will start waking up one fine day to find gorgeous clothes laid out for them to wear and an invitation to a formal dinner taking place down at the plaza at Anchor’s base. The clothes aren't particularly specific to a character's gender, species, or culture - it's all about what the bots think your character would like best. Even if they're wildly off the mark, the clothes are still made to fit and fashioned beautifully. The invitations are marked "TOMORROW, STARTING AT 6PM LOCAL TIME." A smaller note underneath instructs attendees to see the tailor bot adjacent to the spa if they are unsatisfied with their assigned clothing, and also that the spa bots are on high alert, prepared to beautify anyone who wants some extra pampering and a dash of makeup.

Just be careful. Some of the makeover bots are really fond of glitter.

b. quite the spread.

True to the word of the invitation, the plaza is closed off under large white tents and guarded by bots who encouragingly steer you elsewhere should you try to get inside. They're nice, polite, all the things they've been programmed to be whether they like it or not, but there will be no sneaking by them into the party area.

At 6pm on the dot the day after the clothes arrive, characters will find music playing on all levels of Anchor, broadcast from the musical robots who have been practicing ever since that first tiny party almost a year ago.

Invitations will be taken by a bot in an impeccably tailored suit, and characters will be welcomed onto the red carpet that curves around the edge of the park and into the area cordoned off for festivities. The flashbulbs and cheering of bots that line the carpet echo through Anchor, broadcast along with the music until it sounds like the entire place is full of faintly electronic cheering. Each arrival is greeted with a fresh wave of enthusiasm, their image projected larger than life against the interior of Anchor's dome.

The sides of the tents have been rolled up, revealing the absolutely decadent set-up within.

Rows upon rows of buffet tables laid out with the most extravagant and strange dishes for residents to try. All of it delicious, though not all of it will appeal to every palate. There are sweet dishes, savory, spicy, whatever you can imagine. Appetizers of a hundred different kinds. Fruit plates formed into works of art, showing places and events from around Anchor. There are spun sugar reindire. Tiny plates of hors d'oeuvres that depict the faces of residents, both current and former. One particularly large dish is sculpted in the shape of what looks like an explosion emanating from Anchor's base, near where the locked and flooded rooms were found.

There's a cake near the middle of it all, frosting painting an image of a young, smiling man. Anyone who's seen him will, after a moment, recognize the whole and handsome features of a much younger Creepy Joe - the words on the cake say LET'S CELEBRATE OUR OLDEST LIVING RESIDENT!

While most of the food is at least recognizably from the general stores and from the agricultural level, there are other plants and garnishes that look entirely foreign. If asked where they came from, the bots will simply insist they're part of Anchor’s available resources.

There is also a full-service bar, but...not manned by the usual bartender (for anyone who might ask, the other bots will kindly inform them that the usual bartender is on sabbatical for stress). Instead there's a freshly-built bot serving drinks of all kinds, taking requests for old favorites and mixing up new cocktails based on guests' stated tastes.

The only thing not on the menu is a tequila sunrise.

There's a table full of hookahs and little treats that have various light, pleasant effects. These range from simple mood lifts to treats that will leave characters blissed out and relaxed.

c. dance, our residents, dance!

After people have finished arriving, the band picks up and guests' attention is directed upward toward Anchor's dome, where there's a truly magnificent light show being projected with musical accompaniment. It's spectacular, haunting and beautiful...and it shows more than just lights. It also shows celestial bodies in motion across the planet's dusk-red sky, meteor showers, strange northern lights. The show itself is almost an hour long, and ends with words unfurling across the apex of the dome.


HAPPY ∞ +1 ANNIVERSARY ANCHOR #3, THE LONGEST RUNNING COLONY.

STAY HERE, STAY HAPPY!


The show fades away and the music picks up again, encouraging guests to dance.

Go on, dance.

It’s a party after all.

d. 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 to take out the toothy voids? 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.

Navigation.

Comments

[hypothermic]

Nightly. If they weren't in the middle of chewing each others heads off, he might've smiled when Kabal wasn't looking. That's the kind of almost cute bullshit that tricked Len into thinking this could be different. Right now, all that word does is make his heart pound painfully hard.

Only an idiot would believe Kabal. A sucker. Someone too sad and desperate to know when to quit. Right now would be the perfect moment to walk away. Leaving Kabal hanging would be a power move. The only one Len has right now.

A hard stare at the other man, folding his arms across his chest.

"Take off the mask." Len isn't trying to be precious. He wants to see his face. Gauge for himself whether Kabal is being honest, or looking for easy ammunition.

What Kabal's asking isn't nothing, and what Len's asking in return isn't nothing either. He's not getting messy alone.

"I ain't kidding. You wanna know? Take off the mask."

[kaballin]

This is a trap. It feels dangerous; a setup for something. His drunken brain can't precisely identify what but ..

He reaches up and pulls the mask off completely. Over his head so he can hold it in one hand in case Len's plan was to fucking snatch it and leave him there to suffocate.

Having a life support system fully exposed on his back makes him incredibly vulnerable. It's an egotistical show of strength that something that could easily kill him is within easy reach of everyone he fights. Even having it under the jacket would give him more protection. But no, he's the type of person that won't back down from a fight, admit a weakness or ever ask for help.

Now here he is, holding his mask and fully aware of the limited amount of time he can do that before things will start to get real uncomfortable.

But he does want to know what Len is mad about. Actually cares about what he thinks, which is another thing he's going to shove away to never think about again. There's nothing for him to say other than more questions he's not getting the answers so he simply stands there looking drunkenly confused.

[hypothermic]

Len didn't think he'd actually do it. Now that they're face to face, everything feels... different.

Behind the mask, Kabal looks nothing like Chronos or Mick. As different as they are the same. You're supposed to feel safer with the devil you know.

Len doesn't know what he feels anymore. He'd blame it on booze, but out of the two of them? He's the sober one. Suddenly, being three sheets to the wind sounds a hell of a lot more appealing.

Kabal kept his word, now it's on Len to keep his. He can't walk away the bigger man if he bitches out. Thieves honour, and all that bullshit. Even the most crooked of criminals has a code.

Silence. Watching Kabal's chest heave, breathing laboured. This is uncomfortable for both of them. Somehow, that helps. At least he isn't the only asshole with a chink in his armor.

His fingers clench into the elbows of his jacket, eyes staying on Kabal's eyes, unblinking, until he finally opens his mouth to speak.

"We came together." Quiet. Hoarse. Through gritted teeth. He'll personally murder anyone dumb enough to eavesdrop. This is between them, and no one else.

"You ditched me. For them."

[kaballin]

The whole attitude of everything seems to have shifted. It's suddenly intimate in a way he hates, especially exposed out here by the cocktail shrimp and fruit platter. There's no way everyone has missed them having a weird little tiff, probably all staring at them now that they're hissing things under their breath. But all of his attention is on Len, doesn't even flick his eyes to the side to see if anyone is watching them.

"I didn't ditch you I.."

Ditched him.

Because he hadn't realized that they were coming together. Like together together. And now it's pretty clear he probably should have considering Len had called him specifically to ask if he was going and then insisted on leaving at the same time. His eyes go wide as the knowledge hits him of exactly what this is about, and that he's a fucking idiot for not having seen it earlier.

He's going to blame the whiskey even though it's entirely his fault.

"And we were gonna leave together too. Kinda figured you didn't want me following you around while you cased the joint." The words muttered lowly and not only because breathing sucks right now. "You really think I want any of them when I've got you?"

How stupid does Len think he is?

[hypothermic]

Len watches Kabal's face for what feels like a long time, especially for the guy who can't breathe, waiting for Kabal to scream 'You've been Punk'd' in his face, like a psychotic Ashton Kutcher straight out of the deep-fryer. That would make it easier to kill him.

There's a blue tinge to Kabal's scarred lips, and he still hasn't cracked. That's commitment.

For the first time in this conversation, Len's starting to believe he might be legit. It's too much to fully process right now.

"Put the mask back on. You're no good to me more-dead." Is that an answer? It's going to have to be. At least while they're in public. Time might have stopped for an entirely unromantic moment, but the party is still going on around them. Len is going to punch the next person reaching between them for shrimp in the throat.

Can't these crustacean-obsessed losers tell they're having a moment? Fuck it.

Before Kabal can put his mask back on, Len leans in to graze his lips with a barely there kiss. Uncharacteristically soft.

"Stop looking at them, and start looking at me. Or I'm gone. Got it? I don't do second place." Not again. He can't take it anymore.

If this goes down the way it did with Mick, Len's swearing off tall, brawny, charbroiled chunks of beef brisket for good. Platonic, romantic, or chaotic.

He'll go vegan. Like everyone else who hates themselves.

[kaballin]

Well that's softly sweet, a sensation that Kabal can't process because no one has ever been soft, nor sweet, to him in his entire life. There's a half smirk on his face as he pulls the mask back on; finally he understands and doesn't feel like he's drunkenly trying to swim a river littered with alligators in the form of Len's verbal snares.

"Hm, think I can do that." As if he's not undressing Len with his eyes everytime he glances at him.

One of those shrimp obsessed douchebags comes in and Kabal grabs them by the back of the shirt, tossing them easily right into the shrimp platter they desperately wanted. Shellfish and cocktail sauce go everywhere as the table collapses, though by some miracle none on Kabal's fancy white outfit.

Without missing a beat he winds an arm around Len's waist to lead them somewhere with less appetizer obsessed idiots, "Want me to prove it?"

[hypothermic]

"Now that's cold."

If that ain't the most romantic thing he's ever seen. Len laughs, actually laughs, as the douchebag slips and slides in the cocktail sauce like one big, especially ugly shrimp.

"Now, I'm not one to kink-shame, but I'm starting to think you have a food fetish." Thank God/Satan/Alanis Morisette there's no tuna. The totaled buffet is nowhere near as messy or disgusting as their first meet-cute slash murder-attempt in the kitchen, that was too nasty for a repeat (even for Kabal), but there are enough similarities Len can't help but think back to when they first met. Is it too soon to be nostalgic?

He isn't expecting the arm around his waist, glancing sharply at Kabal before relaxing into it. Seeing someone else more humiliated and bewildered than either of them has done a lot to kill the tension, but there's something in the air.

New. Different. Dangerous. Like a good score. The kind that kills you or makes you stronger. The only drug of choice for any real career criminal worth his/her/their salt, because it's a special kind of high. Win or lose, the adrenaline is what makes the blood, sweat, and tears worth shedding, and legwork worth doing.

Len's waited a full year to hit a place. Call it crooked foreplay. He loves it.

"You can try." Len taps Kabal's masked jaw with two gloved fingers, looking up at him with a flutter of his eyelashes, and a smirk twisting the corner of his scarred lips, before playfully pushing his head away.

Talk about a dangerous, near impossible job. Kabal might be the ballsiest thug he's ever met.

[kaballin]

"Me? I think it's you, keep trapping me near tables of food. Like you planned it or something." But there's a jaunty tone in his voice, leading them away from the shrimp-tastrophe he's created. That's someone else's problem now, exactly like the kitchen. He still has no idea who cleaned that up - and he's never going to ask and find out because he doesn't care. Not important. Some peon or do gooder or robot took it on themselves to clean up his mess. And if they hadn't? He wouldn't have cared about that either. Life was so much easier when everything became someone else's problem.

"You know... Everyone is here right? Which means there's probably some good shit left undefended." The residential area, generator rooms, the lab. Might be a good time to hit some of those places up, have a look around.

Kabal's been here for almost a year, but there's still plenty of places he hasn't investigated, both due to laziness and because he hasn't had the time. And while his thoughts are going more towards thievery and trashing the place, he gives Len a look making it clear that fucking him into the rubble is also in the cards.

Now that their little blow up has smoothed over, Kabal is back to being in a good mood, albiet far drunker than he'd intended. Fortunately he's pretty good at holding his liquor, years of experience aren't for nothing. But he's gonna be feeling this one in the morning.