returnjourneymemes | TEST DRIVE 002

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test drive meme

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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Viktor doesn't make it too far before Volk comes squawking. Hello stops him, turns him back halfway, edging impatient; of course he's listening.

"Of course I will."

He didn't leave everything behind and come all this way just to stand next to a glass tube while a stranger dies, and his frown has creased up with disgust for the suggestion. This isn't about him, though, or what kind of person he is. (Isn't it?)

"But you don't have to do it. It was only a suggestion—I'm not going to force you."

"You don't need to, I want to see this. But I do want to make it clear where my limits are, alright? I'm not that curious."

He walks out, finally, strides to catch up with Viktor.

There's something funny about the way new wardens come in seeing inmates, and this isn't the first time he's caught it. They get defensive fast. Maybe they're uncomfortable about keeping people locked up. Volk wishes that they'd do something more productive with the emotion.

Good, then.

Those few ruffled feathers have smoothed by the time Volk comes up alongside, though it may appear otherwise, given the eyebrows and all.

"Fair enough," and filed away, another feature added to this sketched impression of a person. After a few smoothly asymmetrical strides, "So, you haven't been to the Infirmary—how much of the ship have you seen?"

From inmate housing to the central axis isn't the shortest trip; they're going to have to fill it somehow.

"I don't know how much of it is behind locked doors, and obviously they won't let me see the outside - so I'm not sure. I would guess it's less than half. I haven't been very deeply into the storage room, because I'm not a fan of dying in an industrial accident for no reason."

Lots of ways to die that he's not a fan of.

"Why do you think it's a ship? Besides that they said so."

"I've seen the outside."

His attention lifts, eyes up and looking, taking in the whole of the corridor before them.

"After I agreed to the contract, a shuttle came. It was..." Incredible, honestly. His eyes are bright with the memory. "It was real. And not a short trip," he adds, with a slight lean. "I, eh, couldn't sleep on the way. Too nervous. Too much to see."

"I was out until the garage. That's where I woke up."

He's not over it. He's not done being rattled, and angry, and offended. Ever.

"I don't even remember falling asleep or being knocked out or anything. I was just taken."

In the time it takes Volk to say this, Viktor's expression has shifted toward the pensive: a few rapid blinks, a momentarily deeper frown.

"What's the last thing you do remember?"

Edited (nah that was dumb) 2022-02-14 09:11 (UTC)

"My life flashed before my eyes and I saw a long tunnel."

It's sarcastic. He's been quizzed on this before, like if someone asks enough questions they can unbury his repressed Death Memories.

"I don't remember dying. I was in a conference hall. Why would I be dead?"

Edited 2022-02-15 02:18 (UTC)

His facial shrug is undisguised: hell if I know.

"Maybe it happened so suddenly you didn't have time to process it. Or from behind. If you don't remember it, you could consider yourself lucky—there are worse ways to go."

Ha ha. We have fun here. The elevator's coming up; he takes a few longer strides, smooth, to reach the panel first.

"Or I could consider myself not dead, because anyone can literally lie about anything for no reason."

It's like people just forget that? It's like people forget that anyone can just say ANY words they want.

"It's not even weird to lie to prisoners in a lot of countries? They tell them they're thousands of miles away from where they really are, they say no one's written to them, they say their spouse remarried..."

Shrug. He shoves his hands into his jacket pockets and hangs back so Viktor can open the door.

"Letters might be nice." Not only for inmates. "Is there someone who would write to you? A spouse?"

Almost certainly not the point, but he's curious.

Also operating the elevator hardware like he's already familiar, nearly automatic and still attentive to the process in a way that says it pleases him. Doesn't belt in for the gravity swap; does grasp one of the hand straps.

"No, the ship printed me my obituary and gave it to me. According to the official narrative, my family is out there mourning me, selling the things I own, and having no idea that I'm still here. My job got given to someone else, my apartment is going to get sold to someone else, and so far no one has even told me what I'm supposed to be doing or what I even did wrong. Everyone thinks I'm fucking lying about that, because someone neither of us know told them I'm evil."

Volk doesn't do either, just wedges himself in a corner and closes his eyes. The nausea is worse than the fakey gravity shift, in his opinion.

"Hate these things."

"The ship give you your own obituary?" He's still stuck on that detail, yes. "That seems excessively gruesome, even for prison. I'm surprised it's an option."

He's frowning thoughtfully, hooking the bent stock of his crutch over some useful feature or other, levering it in there so it can't just slip free.

"As for the, eh... pronouncement," his feet are about half an inch off the floor and counting, "I'm sorry to say I know little more than you do. There are case history files, of course, but those are reserved for permanent assignments."

Volk's shoulders are jammed into the wall and his feet are planted like tripods - he can push back and down to keep his feet flat.

It's helping, but it's not perfect. He looks pretty pale. He still hasn't opened his eyes.

"Eбать. Hang on. Give me a second. Too much moving."

Vertigo. Can't formulate sentences. Please hold.

"Oh. Yes. Of course."

He says, floating.

"I did not react well to my first trip in one of these. I, eh... well, let's just say you're in good shape. Comparatively."

One shoe catches a solid edge with just the toe, pushes gently to encourage his legs to reverse their forward swing. The module ought to kick in any second.

"This is a long one— ah, there we are."

The gravity kicks back in and Volk tries to just breathe through it, just think about something else, just ignore the faint hallucinations he gets during vertigo - white noise, spots of wavy, dappled teal along the walls like he's trapped underwater. If no one else is reacting to it, it isn't there.

He pushes off of the wall as soon as the doors open and gets back to solid ground. Solid-ish.

"Why can't they just give us some stairs, too. Oh, because it wouldn't fit the branding. Right, sure, right. There's going to be a fire some day and we'll all wish there were stairs then. As we die, because the elevator is now a functioning pizza oven as well as the world's worst amusement park ride."

Volk's complaining often ends in everybody dying.

With an open palm, Viktor gestures for Volk to precede him, and follows. He almost, almost laughs—because of the delivery, because it's a ridiculous combination of items, implied grisly deaths aside—but restrains himself, because at heart it is a valid concern.

"I hadn't considered that. For me the lack of stairs has been a relief... but if we burn to death in a lift, what's the point. I suppose we'll have to hope the fire suppression system is at least as advanced."

He's definitely going to research that now that it's in his head—probably it will deepen his frown lines—

"The Infirmary is just ahead. Fingers crossed it's unoccupied."

"Why? They can leave."

Fuck off, we're testing the Science Tube, get your hangover meds later.

"It would save us the trouble. I don't feel like explaining myself," he adds, with a hint of conspiratorial lean, and knocks his CommLink against the panel. A positive chime; tinted glass slides obligingly.

His head disappears inside— "Hello? Anyone?" —and returns briefly— "We're in luck." —before the whole of him goes on in, leaving just his gloved hand on the edge of the door, as one might hold an elevator. Just in case.

"Mood lighting," he says of the standby ambience. "Very mysterious."

Volk zips in and then bounces on the balls of his feet.

"The only thing that could turn this prison thing around would be if I get in there as a human and come out as some new kind of monster that science has never heard of and everyone can only fear. And you think this is a joke, but I'm at rock bottom right now, being a human being sucks ass twenty four seven, and I REALLY need a win."

He points at Viktor.

"But not a suffocated monster. Agreed?"

With a nod, "Agreed."

He's at the control panel, his hand in an elegant shape and engaging it with snatches of his middle finger, like a bird pecking at the screen.

"Mm, no monster setting. M for mutation, maybe—" It's diagnostics, he's setting it up for diagnostics. "You can climb in whenever you're ready. Oh, eh... no need to disrobe." Please do not disrobe. "And let me know if you have any specific complaints you want addressed."

Volk ...hesitates.

"What is it actually supposed to do?"

Surgery? Medication? Spray tanning??

Edited 2022-03-01 04:37 (UTC)

"Well, it says it can do an assortment of things. The menu is fairly comprehensive. I haven't personally tested every function—there are surgical settings, and, eh... that is not exactly something you do on a whim. But, to start, it will examine your body, optically, and show the results. Don't ask me to explain how it works, because I have absolutely no idea." Yet. "We have nothing like this at home. The level of automation is..."

This hand gesture starts as this, an object, shortly becomes what the hell are we even witnessing here on this day.

"...it, it, it's insane. It's completely insane."

He may not be smiling, but he is glowing. He loves this.

"If it does what it says it does. Would be interesting to put someone in there that needs- "

Gesturing to something at random -

"treatment for hypothermia, and find out that this has a lot of ways in which it can't live up to what it was built for.

Do I have a safety button on the inside? Did you notice anything like that in there?"

Oh, that's a good question, says the angle of his eyebrows. Bracing a hand on the edge of the open pod, he leans down—without hesitation or suspicion for the close presence of an inmate—to have a look in both directions, head and foot.

"I don't... think so... perhaps it would detect distress and respond accordingly. In any case, common sense would suggest equipment like this shouldn't be operated alone."

Which has definitely failed to stop Viktor himself from doing it, and will continue failing at this for the foreseeable future.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

TEST DRIVE 002

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oooh this was the night notifs went down huh. sorry

nooo worries

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