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cursedcontent2022-08-20 11:49 am
cursedmods) wrote in cursedcontent2022-08-20 11:49 am
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TEST DRIVE MEME #1
TEST DRIVE MEME #1
A Blood Offering
You wake up cozy in bed at the Saturn Motel. As you observe the room you may realize that it looks a little dated. Or, perhaps from your point of view the lamp and TV are wildly futuristic. Or, like Goldilocks, it may seem just right: close to the world you just left behind. Either way, you just had a very strange dream (see the arrival scenario) and now you're here. And you're not alone: there's a bed next to yours and someone else is waking up just like you are.Roller Rink
You can chat for a while if you like, but if you try to leave you'll find the door is firmly locked and no amount of kicking, punching, or hitting it with an object will do you any good. Instead, there's a letter on the nightstand which reads:
"Good morning and welcome to your new home!
You may be wondering why you're trapped in this room. Fear not, the door will open easily if you offer a bit of blood. More than a few drops but not enough to be a serious wound. A handprint's worth will do, let's say, and it only needs to come from one of you.
I'll let you sort that out yourselves. See you on the other side.
Sincerely,
The Mayor"
And indeed, a handprint's worth of blood pressed against the door will unlock it and let you out into the world. Do you volunteer your own blood? Do you take it from the other person by force? It's up to you! But there's no food in here, so you better figure it out eventually.
As a celebration of your new lives here (and an apology for the whole blood offering thing - they were just testing something out, really) the Mayor has invited everyone to the Crazy Eight Roller Rink for a private, after-hours party.Mallrats
Attendance isn't mandatory, but it is heavily encouraged so that you can meet your fellow Cursed and know who's in on the whole secret. It'll help you down the line at some point if your Curse gets out of control and you need someone to wrangle you.
As a reward, everyone who shows up and completes at least one lap around the roller rink (you must be wearing skates, but you can crawl the lap if you can't get the hang of them) will receive a free walkman with a mystery tape inside. The color, style, and mystery tape your character gets are up to you.
Everyone loves the mall! Right? Right! And this group of newcomers is lucky enough to be here for the White Pines Mall Grand Opening celebration! Feel free to walk around the mall and partake in sales galore, check out the attractions, or just get to know the layout of the place.Extra Info
The Mayor has given everyone a gift card for $100 that can be used anywhere in the mall as long as they attend the Grand Opening.
They also strongly suggest that you familiarize yourself with the mall and its layout, just in case you ever get stuck there for a while and have to compete with others for food and resources. But that probably won't happen.
The test drive meme and the IC intro log will have the same prompts, and threads between two accepted characters can count as game canon.
The first prompt is flexible: technically you're supposed to be with one other person, but if you want to do larger groups that's fine.
Rooms at the Saturn Motel initially contain two beds for the prompt, but upon leaving and returning characters will find that they all have their own rooms with one bed. If you want a roommate, someone better be ready to sleep on the floor or snuggle up! The room doesn't have to look exactly like the reference image as long as it's not too fancy and suitably dated.
hi babe 😎 roller rink
But then Ed turns up, and it's fun. There's food he's never had before, and he doesn't have to pay for it or steal it. There's weird fucking music that makes him feel like he has ants in his brain (but in a good kind of way) and bright colors and so many bizarre looking characters that even in his leather, Ed doesn't stick out like a completely intimidating thumb.
And, most bonkers of all, the actual skating. Wheels on shoes. Ed's not a fucking wet sock, of course he's gonna try it, it looks fun and dangerous and fast. After a few false starts and some drawn out clinging to the rail, (he's not afraid to take a hit, but if he lands on his knee it'll be fucked for days) Ed sort of has the hang of it. He has decent balance- sea legs!- and picks up how to slow and turn from watching others. Even after being given whatever that weird hunk of plastic is, he keeps looping around, picking up speed, eyes narrowed with a scary sort of focus that makes other skaters veer out of his way.
It's through one of these gaps in the crowd that he spots Stede doing his best to stay upright, and with his heart in his throat, Ed tries to call over the noise, gathering attention (less scared now, more amused) as he waves his arms wildly.]
Stede! Oi, Stede!
[He launches himself through the centre of the rink, creating chaos as he cuts several folks off. Ed doesn't notice. He's not thinking, not about curses or magic or how Stede would be safer and happier at home. He's just happy to see his favorite person.]
a reunion as cool as they are 😎
Stede was already having a good time being somewhat ferally gung-ho in a skating rink. This is truly a transcendental addition to the mix. It's the most important thing that's happened to him all day including the kidnapping and weird blood sacrifice door. ]
Ed!
[ If he forgets that he's over here struggling to even stay on his feet while he shuffles onward and ~familiarizes~ himself with the whole, process, that's-- well, it's everyone's business right now, because he makes this mistake in public. So instead of dramatically meeting Ed halfway, Stede nearly eats shit. He has to haul his way back to properly upright really quick, looking like his feet have committed the ultimate betrayal.
So instead, he successfully sticks one arm up and also waves, in full "I sure still am over here in case you've lost the forest for the trees, or the singular tree for the forest as the case may be."
Which is basically the same as lighthouse symbolism, really. Except for the part where it very quickly dissolves into Stede just sort of reaching out to make a squinchy grabby hand gesture directly at Ed, once he gets close enough to spot easily. Beauty. Grace. Elegance. Both of them are the opposite of cringe actually.
There is zero point where he worries about the chaos Ed leaves behind in the skating traffic. ]
facts
He is maybe thinking it so hard that he forgets all that stuff about bending and turning and slowing down, and only remembers it once he's close enough to reach back for that grabby hand, so that their arms sort of end up crushed between the two of them as Ed wallops right into Stede's side, the air rushing out of him in a wheeze. He hangs on tight though, slapping Stede's back and squeezing him in probably the most uncomfortable hug since the dawn of time.]
Fuckin' lunatic. 'Course you'd be here.
[You know, like Stede had any choice in the matter.
Wait. Ed pulls back, looking him over with wide, worried eyes.]
You have that weird fucking dream before you get here? Wake up in the hotel?
[Wake up cursed?]
no subject
Emotionally, it's very gratifying. An ill-advised, arm-crushing, "well I was going to be sore after all the falling down I've done tonight anyway so that's alright," breath-knocking encounter of a hug. The sort of hug that says, Ed is very much definitely here and very much definitely Ed.
He pulls a face. ]
Ohh, that. Yeah. I guess everyone here must have. [ Great for a spirit of teamwork. Sort of.
He's been sorting out his feelings on that. Honestly, the kidnapping is more viscerally upsetting than being told he's carrying a terrible curse. Mostly because he doesn't... feel specifically cursed? He doesn't feel different. So that's conceptually been very easy to ignore, including the little part of his brain that heard "cursed" and went okay, sure, not a huge stretch.
Except!!! If it's happened to all of them then that includes it happening to Ed. Now it's reprehensible and unfair. ]
How are you holding up? [ This is now where his own concerned look-over comes into play. ] You didn't turn up with someone who tried to strongarm you into bleeding on that door?
[ Talking it out or volunteering is one thing. It's another thing to be a dick about it. Important distinction. ]
no subject
Alright, well, not for long. We're doing something about that.
[When Ed heard he was cursed, he was angry. Confused. A little dubious, considering he hasn't noticed fuck all just yet. But there was also a part of him that felt resigned. That held a mirror up to everything he did and everything people whispered about him, and thought, I might deserve this, actually.
He doesn't feel that way about Stede. Finding a way to become un-cursed, as of this conversation, is now one of his top priorities.]
Pffft. Nah. Did it myself. Barely even felt it.
[He holds up the hand he'd sliced to free himself, showing off a kind of gnarly but obviously healing scar.]
Uh, hang on, why d'you ask? Did someone do that to you?
[menacing energy]
no subject
Suppose that'll make us co-curse-breakers. Look at that, we keep finding new titles.
[ It's not not flirting. It's just flirting.
Ed's hand gets a sympathetic little hiss. Poor Ed and his hand. Now the blood puzzle thing seems at least ten percent more bad tbh. ]
Hm? No? I volunteered. I was locked in with this very upset girl, and I thought, well, takes more than a cut to get me down anyway. [ The way that Ed is fully his personal balance support right now. Intricate rituals? Maybe. Stubborn determination to eventually figure out not falling? Definitely. ] Honestly, we'd have been out way sooner if I hadn't needed to talk her around. Not that I blame her, just. You know, at a certain point, it's really easier to get these things over with quickly.
[ They want blood, give them the blood, don't act like it's a big deal, go lose your whole mind about the technofuturistic setting of the 1980s. Duh. ]
no subject
[flirting!!!!! Ed waves off the hiss, making a little 'eh' sound. It's in the past. No big deal. N-]
Huh. Cool. You clean that out properly? Does it need stitches? You know if you cut it in the wrong place, you can fuck up a nerve.
[He grabs gently at Stede's wrist to get a proper look at their apparently matching wounds, which would be super romantic if they didn't already have matching scars- which definitely throws off their balance, but Ed realises his mistake too late, when his skates are already starting to slip out from under him.]
no subject
This is no exception. There's just something about Ed very gently grabbing his wrist and fussing over a little cut like it's a very important cut. Literally who could be immune to that? Only fools. If he has a whole fumble about it because sometimes Ed is just very good and sweet and it's like, untenable, that's his business. ]
It's been fine.
[ Anyway RIP because Stede lacks the coordination to save them even if he too weren't 100% in the little "only people in the skating rink" bubble. They're going down and no one is yelling timber. ]