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returnjourneymemes2022-02-01 02:13 pm
returnjourney) wrote in returnjourneymemes2022-02-01 02:13 pm
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TEST DRIVE 002
RETURN JOURNEY: TEST DRIVE 002
Welcome to the Return Journey's test drive meme! We appreciate your interest. Our TDM features a small sample of events your character might encounter in game, which you're free to embellish or improvise with your own ideas as desired. Don't worry if you haven't read everything yet; while we recommend skimming our FAQ for relevant questions, critical information should be contained or linked within the prompts themselves!
TDM threads can be used as samples for applications. Players can mutually keep threads as game canon after being accepted into the game, though threads featuring non-canon squalls or events may need to be adjusted.
We suggest putting your character's name, canon, and potential role (warden or inmate) as the subject. If you're not sure which role you want to choose, feel free to try your hand at both!
If you have any questions about the TDM, please ask here.
1. Welcome Aboard!
Welcome aboard the SFS Peregrine, a ship in the Admiralty's Transformative and Penal Reparation Fleet. It is presently circling the outer perimeter of the Oos Ring Galaxy.
Wardens have been approached personally by the Navarch with a job offer: Come aboard the SFS Peregrine to assist in the redemption of an inmate, and receive a miracle known as a windfall as payment. Even if you don't ask as many questions as you should, every warden will be treated to a short Warden Orientation video explaining their expected duties and conduct.
Inmates have died and been placed aboard the SFS Peregrine as candidates for reformation. You may have come willingly, offered a choice between death or redemption, or you may have been collected against your will. Inmates are also treated to an Inmate Orientation; you'll find you have less privileges than a warden, but more motivation for...latitude. Violence? Chaos? Bribery? Blackmail? Well, no one said the path to redemption was without a few bumps along the way.
Given staff shortages, some wardens may be asked for a favor. Rather than leaving directly for the Peregrine, you've been asked to pick up an inmate from the limbo between death and redemption. During this mission, wardens will have clearance to enter a snapshot of sorts, where the inmate died (so devoid of other living beings). You either have to talk them into willingly coming along...or bring their unconscious, fresh-from-death not-corpse with you in the Avro provided. Better hope they don't wake up on the way!
Inmates, in this case, you'll be presented with the choice of death or redemption from a warden rather than the Navarch. Or possibly not provided with a choice at all, if death has rendered you unconscious. Good luck when you awaken to find yourself in a small ship, with someone you've never met. Try not to cause any trouble.
2. Pairings
Pairings are a critical aspect of the dynamic between warden and inmate. While interactions between wardens and inmates are not restricted to those in pairings, this relationship is a bit more...inescapable. Inmates test the limits of a warden, whether they take a more typical or unusual approach to matters; likewise, wardens learn what makes an inmate tick (and hopefully cooperate). Chances are, your values will clash.
A pairing of any sort is as varied as the individuals involved in them. And today, courtesy of the Navarch's monthly announcement, you and your sorry partner have been paired. Temporary or permanent, with a warden for an inmate or an inmate for a warden, it's your first day together — out of at least a month, so good luck setting some ground rules and figuring out each other's breaking points.
3. Life on the Peregrine
Hey, inmates! Ever gone to summer camp? Had a sibling? If so, you might see where this is going. If not, welcome to your first experience with shared sleeping arrangements!
The dorms are lined with bunks, though maybe they're better described as pods: futuresque capsules stacked two high, with sleek white paneling and cool blue LED lightning. Each bunk can be closed off with a sliding door privacy and boasts a bladeless fan for temperature control. Bedding is adequate. If such modest conditions do not appeal to you: consider not committing crimes against other people.
And just like with siblings or summer camp, you don't get a say in who your bunkmate is. Maybe you'll luck out and get a light sleeper who doesn't toss and turn in the night. Maybe you won't, and you'll end up with someone who will kill you if you snore. Whoever you get is who you're stuck with until further notice!
Wardens get much more hospitable quarters, but they may want to keep an eye out on the inmate dorms. Just in case an inmate does try to kill their bunkmate.
4. Squalls
Occasionally, the ship passes through squalls, the equivalent of cosmic turbulence that can mess with little things like, say...the fabric of reality. These are shipwide effects, though who they hit is variable. Sometimes you might fall victim; other times you might be the one standing by, exasperated, as you deal with those affected.
(In other words, it's up to player discretion. And feel free to make up your own squalls!)
This time around, the squall comes with an interesting side effect: whenever you lie or someone lies to you, you experience an immediate rush of anger — whether you consciously know someone is lying or not. Think of it as a temporary lie detector, but instead of being hooked up to a machine, you might punch someone in the face.
5. The Peregrine
The Peregrine's layout and protocols have been designed with its intended passengers in mind, who are primarily Earth humanoids and inclined towards certain social and cultural practices. If you're wondering why you are on a ship of Earth humanoids despite not being one yourself, please understand that all ships in the Admiralty have a population capacity. At times it may be necessary to assign other species to a ship of this type, based on availability.
As a warden, you have full run of the ship map. Inmates...less so, but that's nothing a little creativity can't fix, right? Just remember, if a warden catches an inmate somewhere that inmate shouldn't be, it falls on the warden to handle the matter. And if the warden turns a blind eye...well, let's hope neither of you get caught. While it won't result in anything as extreme as a demotion, wardens can expect to get a stern dressing down; inmates, meanwhile, will be reprimanded by the warden who found them.
6. Networking
Now that you've powered on your CommLink for the first time and sat through the short tutorial and appropriate orientation, you're ready to explore the wonders of messaging. Video, audio, or text, the world is your oyster and you surely have opinions on it.
There is no anonymous option and IDs must be some variation of your name. (IC, characters will have to try their luck and see what the communicator will or won't accept when they register; OOC, it's up to players to decide what name to use if the character has multiple names or aliases.)
Wardens have access to a group network filter, something that inmates lack, and can track inmates throughout the ship with their CommLink. Inmates, best avoid getting your device confiscated or monitored.
7. Wildcard
If it's in our game pages, you can use it as a prompt! The sky's the limit.
2
[Illarion doesn't raise his head from what he's doing: Methodically disassembling his CommLink, having already smashed the screen on the edge of the table.]
You?
no subject
[ He's grabbing a chair from somewhere, sitting in it with an air of nonchalance. He's in absolutely no hurry, nowhere to be, just sitting down for a chat. ]
So, who do you think my masters are? And what do you think they need you for? [ You must have a theory, right? ]
no subject
[He peels the camera out of its socket on the device's back, sets it aside. Flips the circuit board back and forth between his fingers as if studying it.]
What mortals always ask for: the impossible. To change the course of a world.
[The circuitboard snaps as he bends it over one finger with his thumb.]
What's to want about being here? [He has his theories.]
no subject
[ Lucifer smiles. ]
I like helping wayward souls. It's my calling. I find it challenging and fulfilling.
[ He never lies, and that is the bald-faced truth. ]
no subject
[He pries up a processor. Guy's got some tough fingernails.]
You like helping wayward souls. [Finally, he raises his head. His eyes, behind their veil, don't focus on the other man's face.
He's quite blind.]
Good. Send mine back to hell where it belongs.
no subject
[ He's, like, chinhandsing at you. ]
And Hell! What's your world's Hell like? Call it professional interest.
no subject
Illarion tips his face back down and resumes prying bits of plastic and wire off the circuitboard.]
I know, [up comes a resistor,] what I was told. Are you saying they lie to us, also.
[It's a non-answer, deliberately obtuse. Oh, he knows about desire, of a certain kind; it was a Warlord's job to deal with men's desire to kill their neighbors in war. He'd done that ably enough, playing desires against their owners to (usually) less-bloody ends. Usually--not always.
That might be in the dossier they've got on him. Might not. Was all he'd done then accounted a crime? His failures, certainly: Towns razed, armies hewn down without surrender taken or quarter given. His successes, too?
A beat, as he takes in that strange notion: Professional interest?] It's a place to rest between lives. It isn't Paradise.
no subject
[ That's not accusatory - it's simply a fact. Lucifer crosses his legs absently, glancing at the inmate. Definitely not human, that much is obvious - which weirdly would probably pose a unique challenge for Lucifer. He himself is also not human, but nearly everyone he deals with is. And even celestial problems are essentially the same as human ones. Celestials were just the human prototype. ]
So your world has Heaven and Hell and reincarnation? Fascinating. Have you actually been, or are you just making more assumptions?
[ Because he's here to do a job, isn't he? And poking at his inmate's issues is part of that. ]
no subject
[Pop. Illarion sends a processor skittering across the table. He doesn't move to retrieve it.]
What matters in the biting moment is if they're wrong. Not that I've made them.
[Off goes another chip. He pauses to examine a scrape that one left across the knuckle of his thumb. Skin's torn but it's not bleeding (of course). ]
Yes. [Prav, Navia, and souls that return--Heaven, Hell, and reincarnation.] And yes. Twice.
What benefit do you get, [back to reducing the circuit board to its component parts,] from asking that question? So I don't assume.
[A trace of irony!]
no subject
The benefit to me is that I learn more about your world, and how you think, so that I can better help you.
[ No, he does not expect to be believed. He's used to that. He's had several millennia of always, always telling the truth, and rarely being believed. Besides, trust has to be earned. That's also a lesson he's learned from experience. ]
Also I run my world's version of Hell, so as I said, professional interest.
no subject
There's two interesting things to consider here--two things that engage him more than the trivial, satiating act of destruction.
One: Either this Warden doesn't have a dossier on him, or it benefits him to pretend he doesn't know.
Two: This is a black god, or something like one.
If he felt anything he might feel some kind of holy awe at that, some impulse to genuflect. The best he can manage at present is to sweep up the debris before him and put it to one side, then fold his hands before him to still them.]
The best you can help me is to send me back. [He lifts his head once more, angles it birdlike to one side.] Will telling you get me that?