cursedcontent | TEST DRIVE MEME #1

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!tdm

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.

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.

Roller Rink

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.

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.

Mallrats

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.

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.

Extra Info

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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

one — blood offering

( peter awakens slowly, soft light of the room filtering in between half-opened eyes. he's cosy and without the hangover he'd been expecting to split his skull in two when he'd gone to bed and buried himself in blankets.

he thinks he remembers groot banging on his door and shouting something about the end of the galaxy, or the ship, or something. whatever it had been, it couldn't have been that important because he'd fallen back asleep quite promptly afterwards.

apparently.

he thinks he remembers a dream, something about being cursed and — a city? whatever.

he rolls to the side, pulling the blanket about him before abruptly coming to the realisation that both the bed and the blanket are softer than what he's used to, that he's not on the ryder and—

his eyes snap open.

uggggggh, nope, definitely not the ryder. )

—Morning?

two — mallrats

( it feels like earth and it gives him the heebie jeebies. he's never quite been able to decide how he feels about earth in a specific sense — like, of course he's super grateful that it both exists and continues to exist, and he'd like to help it keep continue doing the latter, but ever since he and kitty ceased to, you know, be an 'and', there's not been a whole lot to tie himself to the planet.

sure, sure, there was the occasional incident with the x-men or the avengers, in the sense that both got involved with messes that they shouldn't and the guardians were inevitably roped into giving a hand, but—

—that was kind of few and far between these days; and the guardians weren't really — much of a traditional group as things stood.

more than that, peter feels like he's just time traveled back to his childhood. he remembers begging his mom to take him to the mall, begging her to buy the coolest, newest toy.

at first, he stands outside playland toys and games, studying the window and trying to work out how much of it he actually, really, genuinely remembers. he moves on, of course, and ends up outside and then inside la pointe.

in one hand, he holds a cassette — tears for fears, the hurting, thanks — and his attention shifts sideways, to the person closest to him. )

And they say that physical media's dumb.

three — i do what i want, network

un: quill
Now that we've done the 'raise your hand if you know this one very specific reference from my home planet' thing and the 'wait, did we share an ice cream at the roller rink this one time' thing, there are a few more important questions to answer.

1. Drinkable coffee — no/yes/where?

( that's it, that's the list of questions. )

four — wildcard

( want to do something else or approach a prompt in another way? totes go for it! pm me if you want to run through anything. )

Edited 2022-08-20 21:15 (UTC)

more like ew.
coffee is gross.
for your sake i hope its nowhere.

do you mind talking me through how you finding coffee gross means I don't get to drink it anymore? because I'm almost 100% sure that the two aren't related.

[ He glances over, as if checking to see if the guy's talking to someone else. For a moment, Steve considers just going back to looking at the cassettes (specifically looking for The Works by Queen, so his favourite songs can be on hand), but that's probably rude. ]

Do they? Say that, I mean. [ Also what media exists that isn't physical?? He motions to the Tears For Fears cassette in the guy's hand. ] Great tape. Gotta say I think I like Songs From The Big Chair better, though.

Yep. ( is his answer. is he going to elaborate on what he means? no, no he is not. he'd gathered from the dream and the waking up next to a stranger in a motel room that he'd never been to in his life — although he's pretty sure he's been to a motel room that was, like, the spitting image of it back when he was a kid — and from conversations he's had at the roller rink ""party"", they — the ""cursed"" — are from all from very different places. ) They're totally uncultured though, and have no idea what they're missing out on.

( it's been a long time since peter's been anywhere that sells cassettes — the last time he'd been on earth, he'd found that music shops were all but a thing of the past, and the few that did exist had circled back round to selling vinyl which was fine, but vinyl wasn't exactly ideal for transporting back to space. and cassettes, more than any other medium peter's familiar with, has one great advantage: all you need is a pen to fix it. CDs? nah. once they're scratched, they're scratched, and you can't keep recording over them. records? same problem, only worse.

plus, the slow degredation of cassettes is charming in its own way, and each time he's needed to re-record one or some of his favourite songs, it's involved the space version of a roadtrip, one of the few times peter prefers to travel alone.

he lifts a shoulder in a loose shrug, the physical equivalent of an 'eh, you do you.' steve's opinion is totally valid, even if peter really doesn't agree. )

Looking for something specific?

Uh. Queen.

[ Steve shrugs a bit, deciding not to dwell on the idea of physical media. The guy seems a bit odd but that seems par for the course here. He goes back to looking through the tapes, then he pulls one out with a triumphant sort of a-ha. ]

Keep Passing The Open Windows. The song sort of got me through a kind of shit time, feel like maybe it'll help with whatever ... This is.

[ He gives his hand a bit of a wave, insinuating the general everythingness of what's going on. ]

honestly i'm still waiting for raised hands on the specific reference thing
and wow, there was ice cream?

but sure, i'll play: i saw coffee at the motel cafe
whether it's drinkable.. who knows

You and me both.

( not that peter's bothered asking on a grand scale: this isn't his first rodeo as far as the multiverse goes after all, and after recent events he'd be surprised to see any of the other guardians anyway.

and that's skipping past the fact that he's conflicted on whether or not he even wants to. )

Neapolitan, every kid in the 80's favorite flavor.

It's drinkable but it's not coffee. It's just a cup of hot.

[ "statfleet" isn't even that specific a hint, so it's beginning to bother christine that no one's biting, but she's going to push that far, far away. it may be her first rodeo as far as the multiverse is concerned, but she's going to make the best of it. ]

the 80s of which century?

[ she thinks she's got a good idea, but. might as well ask. he seems to have more of an idea. ]

they were also offering milkshakes, not sure if that's any consolation

( peter's met people from his relative future, but the question still manages to take him by surprise. )

The 1980s? Pretty sure it was created to complement the neverending beige and browns of the 70s.

Only if it includes espresso.

( quill is not getting up with any degree of grace without it. )

i was afraid you'd say that

[ there are times christine doesn't actually like being right. this is one of them. but yep, that's her suspicion confirmed. 1980s. that's a long, long way in the past. ]

you'll have to ask them
you know, a caffeine addiction doesn't take too long to kick
not even in this century

peter quill, marvel comics

un: lovelyrose

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mallrats;

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un: chapel

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un: Pegasus

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network, un: desdemona

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but what if I said also the mall now that they are bros?

also yes

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