countryclub | October Test Drive Meme!

OCTOBER 2022 TDM

Another month, another test drive meme! Our test drive memes are open to anyone interested - regardless of whether or not you join our game!

All Test Drive Memes are game canon. Players can choose to keep their TDM threads canon or not. TDM threads can be used for AC and can be used as your writing sample for your application.

Our TDMs serve as a way to build into the actual lore and worldbuilding of Deer Country and we strongly encourage everyone to enjoy and participate! Current players are always welcome to pull prompts from the TDM to reference on the Network or bring into logs as well as tag out to new characters top-leveling on the TDM itself.

Characters will always be able to actively die during TDMs as this is an extremely dangerous world. You can still have this be game canon! Check out how character death in Deer Country works here.

If you have any questions about the TDM, please ask down below!

IMAGE DESCRIPTORS IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE
Prompt One
[Image One: A snowy, rocky beach in winter. ]
[Image Two: Bowls of mushroom soup and bread. ]

Prompt Two
[Image One: Dali painting of the moon as a city]
[Image Two: Twisted, warped cityscape]

Prompt Three
[Image One: Monster choking a sleeping person to death]
[Image Two: Death hovering over a sleeping person]

BONUS PROMPT
[Image One: Liminal Space image of a nondescript room with strange ledges]
[Image Two: Cenobite woman with borg-like attachments to her face]

[NAVIGATION]

TDM Questions • Reserves • Taken • Applications • Full Navigation

[Jump to Comments]

STANDARD ARRIVAL

WHEN: First Week of NOvember
WHERE: The Farther Shores/The Boardwalk, Koz's Orphanage
CONTENT WARNINGS: N/A

You're one of the lucky ones. Your journey is smooth sailing and you wind up exactly where you're supposed to: on the Farther Shores. You grow out of your squid body without a hitch, either with the help of another Sleeper or one of the Wakers, and you get to discover this new world. All new Sleepers might take some time to find their bearings. It might be tricky to remember how to use your body parts the way you're supposed to. You might stumble around the beach or forget how to talk - but don't worry! It'll come back to you sooner or later.

Hopefully, you've found something to wear, either in your Welcoming Bag or otherwise, and can start familiarizing yourself with your surroundings. Maybe you help some other squids out on the beach. Waking up sucks! You feel for the little guys. And hey, maybe you're hoping one of those squids is a good friend...Stranger things have happened.

SEASONAL DETAILS ON THE BOARDWALK
This is not the greatest month to wash up on the Farther Shores. It's November and you'll pretty much immediately hate it! The waters are frigid but not quite frozen yet, but that won't make your arrival any less uncomfortable. Thankfully the Boardwalk seems well-stocked with heavy blankets and furs to give to newly awakened Sleepers. Barrels of hot chocolate and hot alcoholic cider are readily available to warm people up. There are several stalls selling hearty soups willed with mushrooms, potatoes, beans, and other filling components.

Fresh baked bread and pastries are sold on wax paper. Enjoy a steaming cinnamon roll or croissant or just your standard bread and butter. Many bakers have set up temporary stoves and seem to invite teaching Sleepers how to cook and prepare bread and pastries. Maybe knead some dough, learn some tricks of the trade. If you help out ab baker, they might even thank you with a sack of flour or other ingredients for bread!

Like last year, as the Moon shifts to Bone, whispers and hushed talk begins anew among the Trenchies about The Tower. There are whispers that something feels wrong. "You know Trench is his body, right?" one might say. "But look at what's been happening. Is everything alright?" There is nervousness, agitation. Trenchies can't seem to put a finger on it. One of the old fishermen mutters under his or her breath if overheard in this time. "Long time since we tried to leave the Tower's shield. Hope didn't bring anything back from out there. World's a strange place."

None of them seem to have anything specific to add. They just seem nervous for some reason.

[JUMP TO TOP] • [JUMP TO COMMENTS]

IMAGE OF THE SELF

WHEN: Halloween through all November
WHERE: All of Trench
CONTENT WARNINGS: Distorted Reality, horrifying cityscape images, mounting paranoia, displacement

"They say that Trench is the body of the Tower." It is a saying so often repeated during the Bone Moon season that it becomes more of a mantra. Whether or not it is actually true remains a hotly contested debate between Arcane Scholars and Disciples, one of the few times that neither side fully agrees even with themselves. Yet, if it is true, what happens if the person whose body serves as a city begins to have an identity crisis of sorts? That certainly seems to be the case this month.

At random times, it just happens. You're walking from one place to another with your friend. You just stepped out of a lantern network teleportation circle. You open a door. Suddenly, everything is just wrong. It feels like you are in a surrealist's nightmare. Walls appear to be bleeding concrete in all directions. Stairwells twist impossibly, as if M. C. Escher himself were the architect. The pathway to where you intended to go warps and transforms itself into a perilous, twisted monstrosity that you have to navigate. Worse? The way you got here is just gone behind you, leaving you only the path forward.

Navigating this isn't impossible, but you will definitely need help. It might be that one has to stand on another's shoulders to get over an obstacle and then help them up. Maybe someone very small has to crawl into an opening to reach the door handle so the way through can be found. It varies, and the effect lasts only as long as it takes to get where you're going, but while you're here the reality continues to shift and some of these twistings could easily crush you! Don't tarry too long!

NOTE: The physical danger here is from environmental hazards. Feel free to choose any you like, but they will all return to normal when your character reaches their intended destination. Trenchies know nothing about this, though if one asks one of the former wastes, they will ward themselves as if against evil. They know something, but they dare not speak and will whisper hurriedly that the sleeper had best not talk too openly about this. "Best not to draw attention right now."

[JUMP TO TOP] • [JUMP TO COMMENTS]

A GOOD NIGHT'S SLEEP

WHEN: Last Week of October through the first week of November
WHERE: At Home, in your bed
CONTENT WARNINGS: Severe Insomnia, Sleep Deprivation, Deprivation induced hallucinations and mood swings

Something is clawing at your mind from the moment that the first signs of the cold coming. You can't put your finger on it, but even as you see the people of Trench preparing for the next month's arrival of sleepers, you can see they feel it too. Something claws at the mind and for a few people in Trench, this becomes a very literal problem. The thoughts are so overwhelming that you can't manage to find a good night's sleep. This problem is especially prominent for new Sleepers, who seem prone to arriving with terrible bouts of unexplainable insomnia.

That sounds simple enough to deal with, right? Perhaps some sort of sleep aid, or working oneself to exhaustion, and you can power through it, right? No. Nothing seems to work at first. Searches for a monster are futile. Warding and incense seem utterly ineffective, and no matter how hard you try, night after night you cannot sleep. You are terrified of falling asleep. If you fall asleep, you may never wake up! Even characters who do not fear a mortal death feel themselves compelled by this, and the longer that they do not sleep the more corruption risks them at its door. A night or two missed is one thing, but eventually irascibility sets in. Hallucinations may eventually start to crop up. The body needs REM sleep. It needs dreams, yet the horror that threatens the person will not allow them to sleep, for fear that it will come for them while they sleep. What 'it' is, they do not know.

There is only one solution. For those who already spend time with others? This is a simple thing, but they must still agree to do it. You can solve this curse only if you do not sleep alone. Another must stay awake for the vigil through the whole night. Simple enough given their insomnia, but they will be assailed by their own horrific lack of slumber. Only, after you have had a good night's sleep, be sure to care for the other who was so kind to you. Why? Because anyone so unkind as to not help their erstwhile companion sleep after they have finally gotten rest will find out that those fears were not unfounded and the next time they sleep, they really do not wake up!

Death, in this rare case, comes in the form of a heart attack. Its source is unknown, and all that the sleeper will remember is the worst nightmare of their life as they lay in bed, dying in soundless screams. So, be sure to take care of each other, sleepers!

[JUMP TO TOP] • [JUMP TO COMMENTS]

THE VEINS OF THE TOWER

WHEN: November 1st (And only November 1st)
WHERE: Beginning anywhere, ending in A Nightmarish Place
CONTENT WARNINGS: Liminal Space, Disorientation, Hints of horrible monsters, Possible Death, Insane Zealotry, Mutilated Bodies

Rumors have lingered since the first encounters two months ago of a 'space between spaces' that people could accidentally fall into that this occurrence has not been entirely limited to the month it first happened in. Every once in a while, on unusual days, it has happened since that time. There appears to be little rhyme or reason to it, but it has happened again. Maybe you took an accidental step backwards. Or maybe you were crazy enough to have identified some spot you disappeared before and you were actually experimenting with the effect every day to see when it happened. You know, to chronicle the dates it happen, to keep a record, to understand it better, all of those sorts of things that cause some sleepers to poke things that are Better Left Alone because that's what some sleepers do with their free time, and then they touch the spot with something and suddenly they and everything around them are sucked in. How you got there is not important. You're here now, wherever here is.

Only this time its different. You're not in the spot you were last time, and in the distance you can hear shuffling of feet. Dread enters your heart, as you know that you do not have the means to fight whatever it is. You have an overwhelming urge to run, to flee at top speed. You and whoever is "lucky" enough to be with you must run as fast as you can, around corners, a roaring, inhuman scream echoing through the hallways, slamming into walls. You can't quite see it, not unless you want a swift, awful death at least. But around a corner there is salvation, an elevator shaft and the door is open. Frantic scrambling, running and jabbing buttons will cause the doors to close, just as something black like a giant hand grabs the far wall. You hear the rush, the scream. The elevator shudders three times as something pounds on it, but you're safe. Or, are you?

Instead of the usual moldy hallways, you see what looks like a hospital hallway. Anyone who lived through the nightmare may have awful flashbacks, but nothing is chasing you this time. The impossibly stretching hallway seems ceaselessly unchanging, each door locked, at least until you happen to notice a grate on one of the overhead air conditioners open wide. If you are curious enough to crawl up and into it, you're treated to a long scramble through the passageway, right up until you hear voices, menacing ones in the distance. Crawl quietly!

A grate emanating ugly, light is up ahead. As you and your companion work your way over, you're hopefully not heard. Through the grate, you see something awful. Two mutilated and disfigured figures speak while a third, calm and ordered looking woman listens. She seems to have mutilated her throat such that she should not be able to speak, and the other two appear have performed torturous experiments on their own flesh, their twisted visages that of the 'Zealots' that the Sleepers sometimes whisper about in fear. "It is almost time for the harvest. We made the quotas last cycle but only barely. The need is greater. Sacrifices must be made," one hisses. The other nods vigorously. "Yes. The situation is decaying. We have to move to stop this before it gets out of hand."

Before they can say more, however, the third woman looks up, directly at the grate. She smiles once, and a voice echoes from her throat as what appears to be a mouth inside of it moves, her own lips unmoving. "Continue this discussion later. It seems the problem has worsened. We will need to step up security in the meantime." She reaches out a hand and wrenches. The air shimmers around them and suddenly the duct you are traveling in collapses and breaks beneath you. Instead of falling into the farm, however, you find yourself falling through darkness for what seems an eternity, until you collapse hard to the pavement, in front of the entrance to the Gate, your breath coming back to you slowly, shakily.

NOTES: Death is possible should a sleeper assault the first creature. It is a being of impossible angles and blackness, is itself unkillable and will rend its victims to oblivion through brute force. Fighting the Zealots is not possible through this prompt. The grate cannot be opened in time to exit into the Sleeper Farm and engage them. However, the astute will be certain that there was for a moment an actual entry through and into the Sleeper Farm, somehow. Those familiar with these locations will recognize them as being Floor 1, the Stalls

[JUMP TO TOP]

CODING

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Being too new to have lived and grown used to the rhythms of Trench, observing others says something of their expectations, and the friendliness of those on the boardwalk to newcomers with the understanding of washing up naked and, of one sort or another, alone is a kindness toward strangers and outsiders uncommon on the Frontier. Sometimes even uncommon among vampires. This world may be as hard as the Frontier, but its norms differ, as makes sense in a world whose havoc has come from other sources. It remains one of the warmest welcomes he has seen in many a long year.

"By 'into their own'," Mayerling asks, "what do you mean—from squid to their remembered forms? Breaching consciousness again? Accepting that they have come into a new world different than their own?" Again, new though he is, he is not sure, beyond it depending on the person, what stage is considered difficult.

Erwin's been here long enough to have at least learned the ins and outs of arrival (not to mention a few other things, but those are Hard Mode and generally for later conversations) so he's happy to explain.

At the questions he hums thoughtfully but it's not in a patronizing way, he's just trying to figure out how to word what he wants to way, taking it all into consideration and how to explain it. "It's a mixture of all of those things, mostly."

That seems like a weird thing to leave it as so he adds: "Each step takes a different amount of time and cognitive thought for each person, but even if someone can't accept the last aspect of it, I can at least help them to navigate the first two." His voice softens a little at the last part, and it becomes apparent when he continues.

"I was lucky that I arrived at the same time as my companion. By the time I woke, he was with me and it made the adjustment period easier, in a way, to have that familiarity to hold onto."

What must living in Trench feel like if it is not accepted as real? A dangerous existence for wholly different reasons. Not treating threats as threats and acting careless of them or as though they are but nightmares? Hallucinations? What? Perhaps Mayerling lacks some form of imagination or perhaps he has too much to reject Trench as real. Someday he may meet such a person, and he will be sure to learn what he can of their interpretation of reality.

His mind goes to D for a moment. They did not arrive together, but D found him before anyone else. Companion is too strong a word, but someone he recognizes. Someone he's met. Someone he's unlikely ever to forget.

"I am glad for you and your companion," Mayerling says honestly, with more feeling than he means to, for the longing is there in his voice, for someone who isn't here. Hardly a unique feeling, surely. Hardly a unique feeling to long for someone whose time has passed where and when they were. He's not sure whether the hope does more damage than good, but he's not ready to release it.

It's difficult for a lot of people to accept they're in a new place, or that they apparently died, or that their blood is different than it once was. Erwin had taken months to get used to his own blood being poison, so he knows that sometimes... It takes a while.

Still, he knows he's lucky. Extremely so. "Thank you," he says at first, and the other man's tone strikes him enough that his smile turns a little mournful. "With him it was a strange thing. I had just died in my experience, but for him I'd been dead for a long time. It was... Bittersweet, to meet like this. But we've settled, now."

He's an astute man, but he's not going to outright call a man he's just met out for having hope. He's happy to parse it in his own experience, though, to let him know it might not be futile even if he doesn't say it in so many words.

So calm, this man who knows he's dead, this man who knows Trench is all the life that is left him for good or ill, whatever challenges may come. He's likely been here for some time, to have come to terms with that, and the experience of helping others freshly arrived has likely meant calling upon his own pain, loss, and circumstances to connect. As he is now.

"You're welcome," Mayerling intones seriously. Though gratitude easily enough flows both ways. Etiquette remains, at least in this small enclave of existence.

"I am sorry for your loss, whence you came," Mayerling says, "Not many face their own deaths with equanimity. With such discrepancies in time from which people come, surely some learn of their deaths before they happen, whether they knew it came or not." Mayerling knows not the exact time of his death, but vampires are a dying race. His time will come as a part of that as surely as anything else. It's only a matter of how long it will take, as he's never been one to give up and die needlessly.

Erwin has gone through several stages with his death. He started, oddly, at acceptance, then reverted to a form of guilty anguish, and now he's... Well, he's more settled again and he doesn't mind helping people. That's what compartmentalization is for, after all. "I've had time to come to terms with it."

In any case he hums in agreement with everything this man has to say, nodding. "It does often happen that way, yes. It's difficult. Some cling to hope nonetheless. Who knows what knowing the future may do for them? It's difficult to tell."

He hasn't heard of anyone circumventing their own deaths in this manner, but it technically could be possible, he supposes.

Mayerling gives a small inclination of his head in recognition of the personal struggle that must have entailed. Mayerling's philosophical musings, about vampires and himself as part of them, makes the idea a familiar one, if still a sad one. What shall be the testament and legacy of a whole species? He can only hope for more than violence and bloodshed and horrors of the night, yet that is far from their grasp and beyond his control, beyond any one person's control. Even, he suspects, the Sacred Ancestor's.

"Our lives here diverge from them at home," Mayerling says, "It opens a panoply of existences even beyond Trench. One future may be known but not all of them." Not lives in Trench, not lives anywhere else someone may go besides Trench and their home. "We can rest, the future remaining unknowable in its totality."

Erwin seems to be in perfect agreement, in any case: at the other man's note about the malleable manifestation of time and the concept of timeline divergence (though he doesn't know that's the term for it), he nods. "Of course. There are people, I've noted, who seem to know each other, only to find they are from different versions of their worlds entirely."

Which is exhausting to think about, but he'd lucked out. Levi is from further along in their timeline than he is, obviously, but as far as they can tell their versions at least match.

"It's, not to sound too clinical, fascinating to think of how things can and will change depending on the different variables. The smallest change can have the largest effect and so on." Sometimes he wonders if things will ever work out where he's from, but he tries to not dwell on it because he has no place in it any longer.

Mayerling nearly startles, too much the gentleman to do more than blink a few times and tuck one hand into his cloak. There's no threat, only shocking information that should not surprise him so much as it does. The many worlds theory is a basic tenant of quantum physics. Some elements of it, such as coming here to Trench, he simply never expected to experience.

"Indeed," Mayerling agrees, "Sometimes it is our smallest acts, the ones we take thoughtlessly, that affect everything." Not even between worlds but in their own lives. Those are the moments challenging to plan for, the ones that seem inconsequential.

"That is a heavy topic before, I suspect, you break your fast," Mayerling says. "Unless... you are nocturnal?" The question is asked lightly, since Erwin has already been up helping new Sleepers. "What would satiate your appetite?"

October Test Drive Meme!

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