returnjourneymemes | TEST DRIVE 001

RETURN JOURNEY: TEST DRIVE 001

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. Accidents and Sabotage

A. Lights Out

As everyone knows, when it's lights out in a prison...interesting things can happen.

Whether a natural fluctuation from traveling through heavy space debris or something more unnatural (maybe it was you), the power has gone out. While life support continues to function, it's pitch black and any areas usually locked to wardens are left with doors open. It's the perfect setting for a riot, breaking and entering, thievery...your general crimes, petty and otherwise. Wardens, of course, are expected to stymie these efforts, but that doesn't necessarily mean they'll succeed. What's a little chaos between friends?

Our apologies if you happen to be in an elevator when the power dies.

B. Invasive Species

Being in space, sometimes space things happen.

Somehow (and hopefully you or someone you know isn't responsible for that "somehow"), a greater lunar tetacocien has gotten on board. Quite a feat, since they're the size of a rhino, but they have an impressive ability to squeeze through anything large enough to fit their beak. Unfortunately venomous, carnivorous, and native to the starstuff of Oos, the creature needs to be rounded up before it destroys anything (or anyone) aboard the ship. Please do not attempt to eat; the flesh is toxic.

The multi-legged predator can be immobilized with shots from an energy weapon... Too bad inmates can't carry them. Time to improvise! Or steal one, if you're canny enough.

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!)

A. Truth Bomb

One week, those affected cannot tell a lie. Wardens and inmates alike can only speak the truth, though it varies whether they blurt out a response to any question asked or can keep mum.

B. Stuck Together

Another week, you're stuck together. Travel any farther than two meters from your buddy and you'll experience intense physical pain. There isn't anything visible to this connection; it isn't something you can sever (not that this means you can't try). So have fun with your group activities and try not to kill each other.

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

There was a period early in Data's career where he would identify himself as an android immediately when meeting new people. He stopped after observing that biological lifeforms never identified themselves as such unless directly asked, and it has become such an ingrained subroutine he rarely thinks of it anymore.

He doesn't change his expression when she confesses to murder - at all, which is likely one of the slight tells she's noticing, his mannerisms lagging in realism compared to his physical features.

"I see. That would explain your incarceration on this ship." She appears to only be an older adolescent, and Data accesses his recently created database on the rights of children and the impact of trauma on their development. (He had not, in the end, needed to use it for its intended purpose.)

"Thank you for sharing this secret with me," Data says, "I appreciate your expression of trust in me as an authority figure. Would you like to talk about what happened?"

It's asked considerately, but with the same kind of consideration as he would use in asking her if she would prefer to sit on the left or right side of a bench.

It's such a singularly strange response, Jinx can't help but laugh. Her voice is sawing, raspy, as though she's been breathing in smoke for years and years.

"Do I wanna talk about it. That's so..." but the squall pushes in between her eyes, and she realizes, "yeah. Sure. I wanna talk about it."

Her voice curls. Her head twists to one side. Her grin tightens. That was a genuine feeling expressed with a stranger. Time to wrap it up in something safer, less honest.

"Whadda ya wanna know?" She reaches over to boop his nose.

Data doesn't move and he doesn't blink when Jinx boops his nose, remaining still, head inclined in her direction. What does he want to know? The question can be answered on multiple levels, ranging from 'the sum of human knowledge' to 'why did you touch my nose?'.

But first, he considers her. The focus of Data's attention is something that sometimes makes people uncomfortable, because it is one of the least human things about him, a completeness of presence that suggests he is watching and listening to everything you do or say, and thinking about it in ways impossible to discern from the outside.

"Whatever you would like to tell me," Data says, not inflecting it as a question. "I am here to listen."

He finally looks away, which may come as a relief, to look around the rest of the mess hall - not overly crowded, but still populated: "This may not be an appropriate place. We may go somewhere else, or we may change the subject, or we may end the conversation. It is your choice. There are no incorrect options."

What would Silco say? What he always does. Take your hurts and your mistakes, and let them change you. Wear them on the outside. Push them to the forefront of yourself.

Jinx raises her hands above her head and says, "I killed everybody important to me ever! Except one bitch who got away."

She makes the shape of a gun with her hand, and a little pew pew sound escapes her.

"Ha, nah... that's misleadin'. I used explosives." A wink, as though they're both in on the secret, but... maybe they are. That's kind of the point of this whole stupid thing, isn't it?

There are few physical resemblances between this young woman and his brother, but Data is reminded of Lore regardless. There is an erratic quality to her behavior that is similar, but it is different in a way Data cannot articulate to himself when expressed through her. They both engage in apparent acts of humor that are not intended to be pleasant for the recipient, they both disregard his personal space, they both killed people important to them.

Data infers.

"I am sorry for your loss," he says, with a softness adjacent to gentleness, "It must be very difficult for you to bear."

The weight of truth falls unevenly upon her. She feels it press, almost physically, and can't stop it. The only calming thought is the assurance, entirely internal, that she'll get her own back later.

"What's to be sorry about? There are so many people and they all get in the way. They wanted me to make the bomb, so I did. Not my fault-"

She can't say it. The truth stops her.

"Not my- mmph." She frowns, staring at her shoes, her hands rolled into tight fists.

Humans do not malfunction, but Data still finds the word somewhat appropriate for describing what is happening to the one in front of him. But this is a malfunction he does not know how to correct. He does not know how to proceed, except that she did ask him a question.

"They were important to you," Data says, and when he registers the next words he will say he attempts to shut down his vocal functions but finds himself, for no detectable reason, unable to do so, "And you were responsible for their deaths. That is what there is to be sorry about."

She snaps back to face him. Her playful attitude is gone, replaced with petulant fury. "No!" Her voice cracks on the syllable. "I didn't do it on purpose. It just happened."

She reaches out to push him, the prelude to a fight.

Data lets her push him, stepping back to soften the impact on her hands. His chest is warm and yielding on the surface, but Jinx will be able to feel the unyielding polymers and alloys underneath - it feels like pushing a lightly padded steel wall.

"I believe you," Data says. He would even without the squall. He does not believe she intends the outcome of many of her actions, given that she has attacked a warden in full view of numerous witnesses. Poor impulse control, emotional volatility, aggression - she is very much like Lore, and Data does not believe his brother fully intends all the consequences of his actions either.

"Please do not continue attempting to harm me. You may damage yourself, and I will have to restrain you to prevent that from occurring." He would strongly prefer not to do so.

He's strange, so strange it distracts her. Silco always said her mind was a wonder, and she does love a puzzle, but- but. He also said she loved to test her limits. It's not entirely true or false. She likes to test every limit. She likes to push the limit.

She pushes him again.

"Or what?" She side winds in closer, a leftover habit from surviving perhaps too many firefights. "That's the weirdest threat I've ever got and-" she laughs, spontaneous and manic- "I've gotten a lot."

"There is no or," Data says, stepping back with the push again, and while he cannot be confused emotionally, he can find himself at - something of a loss. "I am not threatening you. I do not wish you to be harmed."

The next time she tries to hit him - Data does not dodge so much as he is simply no longer where she was going to connect, inhumanly quick and precise.

"I am handling the situation, please do not intervene," he adds, over her shoulder, directed at someone evidently approaching to render assistance.

TEST DRIVE 001

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