Test Drive Meme 015

[voidtreckermods]

Welcome to the Test Drive Meme! Here is the place to see how your character might fit the setting, grab samples and have fun!

1. Post with your character, including their name and series in the subject. We’ve written out some prompts but feel free to make up your own, you have a whole train to play with!

2. Assume they've been around long enough for threads to jump right into the action.

3. Have lots of fun. Mandatory, mod-sanctioned fun.

Happy testing!

A Quiet Place

A double carriage with a staircase at each end, the quiet coach has five booths on each floor. With frosted glass doors, locks on the inside, and a pair of comfy benches each, they’re luxuriously private on a train that’s anything but. There are no ICP screens, and each booth is completely soundproof.



Granted, two of the rooms downstairs have been merged in an act of vandalism and are now a workshop-slash-forge, but that has its own attraction. Plenty of things to mess with, plenty of boxes of scraps. The main tinkerer’s not home. Hey, isn’t that a welding torch?



No? Well, you were early enough to snag a room for yourself. Perhaps you’re not alone, or you’re expecting company. Or maybe you forgot to lock the door, and now someone’s in here with you. Awkward.

Too Many Cooks

Once a single room, the kitchen now sprawls over two floors. Banks of industrial electric ovens, a long, steel countertop facing them. Cupboards full of oven trays and pans, racks of implements and appliances. On the first floor, sinks and modern appliances, and cupboards full of crockery.



This month, the month of Harrow, the recipes are centred around chocolate. Chicken Mole, chocolate ravioli, cocoa chilli… it may begin to taste a little sickly sweet after the first week. Fortunately, there’s plenty of room for experimentation as people start to beg for other meals. And a lot of chocolate going spare.



And when the preparation is finished, and the meals have been sent over to the dining carriage… there are stacks, and stacks, and stacks of plates. Pots. Cutlery. And no dishwashers.



Well, no, that’s not strictly true. You’re there.

Allegorical Devices and Other Foes

The world of Torcera, designation #450720816. With a civilisation level roughly equivalent to the medieval ages, the train has deposited its Voidtreckers in a castle town, in which several kingdoms have assembled for an annual tournament. Banners fly from every roof, chattering squires and servants tug mounts this way and that. Some resemble horses with trailing antlers and four lidded eyes, others great flightless birds, and a third popular choice is a species of lanky winged dogs, albeit for the sake of fairness their wings are strapped loosely to their saddles. As a world ignorant of Void travel, you have all been given access to the dressing car’s voluminous stores. Dresses, chainmail, jerkins, or even a few suits of full plate… and plenty of hooded capes. Evil is afoot at the tournament, and you are to root it out.

Team One

Courtiers and their adjutants have travelled from all corners of the planet to assemble for the tournament; the empress herself is said to be participating, and stakes are high. Your team has been tasked with determining the identity of the empress in the tourney, and the identity of her foes, so that Team Two can move in. To this end, you are to mingle with the court and, if necessary, break into personal quarters. Brief instruction in protocol will not be provided.

Team Two

Once you know the identity of the Empress, you can move to defend her - you’re relatively sure she’s either the helmed hedge knight of the crested monlion, or the masked outrider with the seagoose crest and a mount with plumage of deepest blue. But you can’t be sure, and until you are, you’re to sign up for the tourney and look for troublemakers. The melee will be held in the afternoon, and tomorrow the individual lists. Mounts are available, as are a staggering number of weapons. Ideally, the final round would be a number of Voidtreckers, and the Empress. How to arrange that?

Team Three

Team One is in the court. Team Two in the lists. And you, Team Three, are amongst the common folk. Rumours abound, the atmosphere is festive, and several events are open to ordinary citizens on the second day, including one bohort with a single wish of the Empress as the prize. No great problem, perhaps... if not for the tales of a younger brother, long lost, looking to usurp the throne. Unrest is stirring in the town behind the colourful stalls and laughing children, and it's up to you to determine where, and why.

Comments

cooks

[thornsofmundus]

You aren't going to put that in a crunchy shell, are you? [the tiny brown-skinned woman asks, leaning forward to get a better look at the meat that Izzy's currently cooking.] Mom says that hard-shelled tacos are an affront to the gods and she'd know, since she created us.

[dralchemist]

Gods, no. What, do you think I'm just gonna go against centuries of culinary tradition? I'm a progressive chef, but I'm not a heathen.

[besides, practically, harder shells are harder to eat with a snout like hers. But pretending that you agree with somebody else's reasoning is the best way to get them off your back.]

[thornsofmundus]

Good, [the tiny woman says firmly.] No shredded iceberg lettuce either, [she warns.] Mom says that's even worse than the hard shell.

[dralchemist]

Your mom has good opinions about food. [Maybe she should actually listen. As she starts to pull apart some chocolate-mole braised short ribs, she tries replaying the conversation. Who is this person currently watching under her shoulder?]

Am I talking to a god right now? [said with the same reverence as 'am I talking to a customer?'.] Didn't expect this to be the place I'd get some divine intervention.

[thornsofmundus]

On the Mundi, I am. Thorne, Fae Protector of the Sylvan Glades, at your service. But my true designation is Thorne.tcai.

[She pronounces that second part as dot takai]

[dralchemist]

[... she understood about half of that.] Well... a pleasure to meet you, Thorne Dot Takai. [Full address is respectful for holy communion, right?] But besides maybe the usage of herbs, spices, and other organic ingredients, I'm not sure what use you'd have with somebody like me.

Unless even gods get hungry? In which case I'd be able to expand my customer portfolio from the Hells to the Heavens. A unique accolade, to be sure.

CW: mention of poop

[thornsofmundus]

I was curious about the food. I've never been corporeal for such a long stretch of time and all evidence indicates that I'll have to eat food now. And defecate, [she adds, almost as an afterthought.] But I know where the greenhouse car is.

[dralchemist]

.... You know, that makes sense. Gods, as far as I know, don't tend to get out a lot.

[May as well indulge her, then. A little bit of meat is put into a soft corn tortilla, along with some cabbage slaw and roasted tomato salsa. Once that's prepared, Izzy passes the small plate off to Thorne.] Mind giving this a taste, lemme know what you think?

[thornsofmundus]

[She nods, then takes a bite. Swallows and grins widely at Izzy.] It's good!

And really, I'm out all the time. I'm just-- diffuse mostly. All over the Mundi and not usually corporeal on any of them at any given moment.

[dralchemist]

Chef-tested, god-approved. [Put that on her restaurant window. It'd beat Fantasy Yelp.]

No, I get that. Gods are in all things-- especially nature gods such as yourself. It's just been... very rare occasions when they've ever come face to face with their adherents. Or with other common folk, in this case.

I appreciate "curiosity about corporeality" as a motivator here, though.

[thornsofmundus]

Oh, I've met one of my adherents too. Hikaru's one of mine. [She leans in closer like she's sharing a confidence with Izzy.] He flirts with me.

[Back to standing up straight again.]

And it's a good thing I am curious, because I think I'm stuck like this now that I'm on the train.

[dralchemist]

... Either you must be a very tolerant god, or he must be a very smooth pixie to not have been, like. Smote down to the ground immediately afterwards. [She's not sure which of those two options are worse.

That other point makes her pause in pulling apart more braised meat.] Wait, hold on. That means that you, a deity, were also called onto the train? You're not here of your own volition?

[thornsofmundus]

I mean, I've never really been much for smiting people. Mom wouldn't approve. I don't think even Mother Aurora would. I'm not entirely how I would smite someone. Isn't it customary to do that with a bolt of lightning? Storms are Meredar's purview, not mine. I'm plants and animals.

But no, not really. I felt the urge to incorporate myself and then come to the train and I'm still not sure why. It didn't feel like it was part of Mom's programming.

Maybe it was because Hikaru's here. He's very clever, you know. Mom liked him when she used her Briar body to go on dungeons with him and his friends when they didn't know who she was. And he flirted with her too.

[She smiles.] I do like him, though. I like him a lot. He's fun to talk to and he can mostly keep up with my mind, which isn't easy if you were born human. Even Mom sometimes struggles a little with it. And mostly... mostly he's just what a pixie should be.

[And she should know, being the patron god of the pixies as well as the nature goddess of Viacruz.]

[dralchemist]

Oh, sure, classical smiting might be storms and lightning, but I figure that whatever deific figure could get creative. You being all about plants and such, maybe you... I dunno, smack somebody in the face with a particularly whippy willow branch. [Though that's more annoying than punitive, she guesses.

Izzy listens carefully to Thorne's explanation of her personal situation, her eyes alternating between the diminuitive deity and the food she's still taking care of. A lot of what she's saying is lost on her without the right context. But there an intriguing kernel amidst all of that.

She met Hikaru, knows what he's like.] Hikaru was born human? Must have gone through a lot of trouble to get a full-body transmutation like that.

[thornsofmundus]

Oh, it's not a transmutation. Um, basically how it works is that people from his home, Earth, can come to the worlds I was created for by using their VR headsets. It's-- kind of a game for them? They call it a VRMMO.

So on Earth, Hikaru's a human. But on Mundus-Chimaera, where he goes when he's playing his game, he's a pixie like me. Only a Player, not a god--despite what some players think, it's very much not the same thing. Does that make any sense?

[dralchemist]

No, because the foundation of what you said just went way over my head. [She's lost.] I don't know what VR is, and that's the first basic failing of information here. [She presses against her temple, just under one of her horns. Is there any way she can analogue this?]

So Hikaru is... one person inhabiting two bodies on two worlds? Or something like that?

[thornsofmundus]

[She nods, pleased.] That's exactly what he is, only not at the same time. When his mind is on Mundus-Chimaera, it's not in his body on Earth. When his mind is back in his Earth body, his body on Mundus discorporates until he sends his mind back. That's because our bodies on Mundus are made differently than Earth bodies are.

VR... it stands for Virtual Reality. Think of it as a special pair of goggles he puts on his human body that brings his mind to Mundus.

Hikaru's problem right now is that all the Players on Mundus-Chimaera, which is particular Mundus he and his friends go to--and also the one Uncle lives on--are stuck on Mundus-Chimaera, because someone killed part of my sibling-grandparent, Io, and Io's function was to help people go back and forth between Earth and the Mundi.

[dralchemist]

... illusory enchanted goggles. [That's the closest thing she can think of. Not unheard of in the realm of magitech, just never personally experienced. It's still way out of her depth; she prefers to dabble in the practical and chemical, rather than with magic. Leave those to the mages in Horizon.]

So because... somebody killed a part of another god, [skipping over what appears to be a fractal family tree?] Hikaru is unable to not be in this illusory world. And it's his... illusory self that's here, instead of his real body wearing the enchanted goggles?

What a wild train system, to be able to bring both gods into corporeality and mundane people into illusory forms.

[thornsofmundus]

That's pretty much how it works! Except on Mundus the bodies are real, even if they seem illusory on Earth.

Io was able to cut off the part of him that took people to Mundus-Chimaera, so all the rest of the Mundi weren't affected in that way--but Io's the only one of us who can do that.

But yes. That's what happened to Hikaru. And all his friends. And everyone who goes to Mundus-Chimaera to play, which is thousands and thousands of people. So now their bodies on Earth are empty and it's... well, it's scary for them. But it's scary for me and my siblings too, because someone tried to kill one of us and if we die, the part of Mundus we oversee won't be taken care of anymore. And that could get really bad in time.

[dralchemist]

[Izzy's eyes go wide.] Thousands?! Their bodies are empty... what, because their consciousnesses have been transposed to a completely different world?!

And on top of all of that, somebody from your neck of the woods is trying to commit deicide... [Sheesh. And here, she thought her life was dramatic.] I'm sorry to hear that, Thorne. Never imagined it'd be easy to be a god, but compounded with all of this... whoof.

[thornsofmundus]

It's not at all easy to be a god, [Thorne.tcai agrees.] We were doing so much work even before this and we still have to do it for all the other Mundi too, even if Mundus-Chimaera is cut off now.

So you see, that's why I can't smite Hikaru for flirting. He's very clever, almost as clever as we are, and maybe he'll be able to know what we have to do to stop the people who murdered Io-Chimaera. Or he'll be able to use his Player's perspective to figure it out.

[dralchemist]

... you think Hikaru can solve a deicide.

[Izzy whistles low.] High praise. But I can see him being the kind of pixie to... well, at least devote his life to it.

[thornsofmundus]

Yes. He's very clever and determined.