test drive — winter

[villagemod]

WINTER TEST DRIVE
Welcome to the test drive and thank you for your interest in The Village. This test drive is not game canon but will allow players the opportunity to experiment with game mechanics, the setting, and the flexibility of choice allowed by this game. The following prompts are examples of typical situations characters might face in the game. At least one thread from the TDM is required as part of the game's application process.

The setting details and locations are still being unveiled in the game, so prospective players are welcome to play with established locations or create their own within the general setting of Mathias.

( Recommended listening: ♫ )

---

INTO THE ENDLESS
Winter has arrived in Mathias. Snow falls steadily, big puffy flakes that pile up quickly in drifts as the wind blows them around town. The trees in the forest are covered in it, the branches bending under the weight and shaking when the piles fall from them to the forest floor. The roofs of buildings become solid white and drifts form in doorways as the wind tries to rush inside anywhere it can.

New arrivals wake in the forest, with its winding paths twisting back on themselves as they branch in either direction. It isn't safe to stray from the path, there is a menacing fog that waits just a few yards inward in any direction, but for now, there is nothing impeding movement along those snow-covered paths that cut through the trees. Continue stumbling in one direction and you'll reach the small town, coming out near the mishmash of quaint houses that nestle beside crumbling ruins that used to be homes. But choose the other and you'll seem to stumble on forever, huddling against the wind until there seems to be a clearing up ahead—

And then nothing. The earth opens up before you in a ravine so deep that the bottom cannot be seen. The other side can be seen, tantalizingly out of reach, and there is the sense that safety is just beyond, if only you could get there. But with that sensation is also the knowledge that if you stay here, you will die. The edge seems unsteady, like getting too close would set it crumbling and send you tumbling into that dark endless nothing that waits below...

BODIES WITHOUT SOULS
Benedict Books is nestled quaintly on the square surrounding Mathias's Town Hall, a thick layer of dirt covering the front windows. Looking through those windows provides a much different view than looking directly into the shop through the doorway — vague shapes and forms of figures seem to be inside, though no details can be determined through the streaks of grime. Flickers that resemble flashlights can be seen passing along the windows from time to time, and on occasion there is even a muffled tapping sound that comes from behind the glass, as if someone is trying to get your attention. The same distorted figures can be seen looking through the windows from the inside outward, but moving from one side or the other reveals... nothing. There is nothing there, and perhaps it is all in your imagination.

A portrait hangs at the front of the store to illustrate the namesake of the little shop... that may, in fact, not be so little. Dust covers everything in sight and detritus litters the wooden floor, as if someone left the door open and allowed half the forest inside.

The books are mostly familiar titles from the 1990s and earlier, but close examination will reveal that key details seem to have been changed. They fill shelves in neat lines along the walls and rows in between, the building almost seeming to stretch on forever until, finally, a small office can be seen tucked away in the back. A glance back toward the front door gives the impression that the room isn't that big, after all. Strange that you previously thought so.

Prying the door open is the only way to get inside the small office; the hinges have rusted and are caked with dirt and grime. Search as you might, there are no interesting bits of information to be found here beyond a few inventory lists on the little desk. There is, however, a green and gold safe in the corner that, no matter how many times one turns the dial, simply clicks and clicks. Scratches around the safe indicate that someone tried to get in at one point, though there's no indication as to whether they succeeded.

THE END APPROACHES
Standing at the center of Mathias, the town hall is a modest two-story building that would be welcoming if not for the faded sign, chipped paint, and deafening silence within its empty halls. It's a typical government building, with a reception desk at the front and rows of identical offices within, the names half faded from each door. But what catches the attention is a large bulletin board on the main wall beside the reception desk, once meant to hold flyers or announcements for the community.

What it holds now is decidedly different. Tacked onto the board are scraps of paper covered in an assortment of handwriting styles — requests for supplies should anyone find them, pieces of information shared in the hopes of someone understanding the strange symbols and mathematical equations, notes about those missing or recently deceased. And over the center of the board, tacked on top of other papers, is a map discolored with age. Mathias Township can be read in the corner, a stretch of forest displayed beneath it, but everything else has been smeared to illegibility with red... ink? Upon close examination, a keen eye will realize that the ink is actually blood, though whether it is human is unknown. And scrawled across that forest, nearly covering the illustration of a clearing and a large house within, are the words

he is coming
A number of tarnished metal pushpins are scattered around the edges of the board, waiting for future messages to be shared, and a stack of pristine white paper and pile of cheap ballpoint pens rest on one of three chairs beside the board. The chairs are clearly meant for those waiting for meetings and are covered in the same layer of grime as everything else in the building — everything except the pens, paper, and bulletin board.

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Comments

Maria Hill || MCU

[swordofshield]

the end approaches

[ Maria wouldn't say she's used to weird, exactly. Largely unfazed by weird, maybe. Stoic in the face of weird.

Perpetually annoyed by, and soforth.

Still, she had thought there would be a good night's sleep between finishing her reports on the colloquially-labeled 'Battle of New York' and the next bit of bullshit on the universal agenda. Or at least a decent cup of coffee and a muffin.

Instead, she finds herself in the middle of a ghost town, still in her grimy gear, cuts untreated and stinging in the cold. She makes her way up the front steps of the town hall--good a place as any to start looking for answers. It's not as cold inside, at least, and she allows herself a moment to warm her hands before making her way over to the bulletin board.

The map draws her eye first, of course. She knows what dried blood looks like, and her extreme lineface shows what she thinks of the message. Under her breath: ] At this point I'd lay even odds against Cthulhu and the milk man.

[ That's when she notices one of the other messages.

In Memoriam, Phillip Coulson.

The stillness of shock ripples through her. ] What the hell?

omg I have never clicked reply so fast

[chuju]

[ Daisy spends a lot of time in the town hall. Long, boring days of ill-kept time have been wasted away in these halls, poring over seemingly endless stacks of papers that have given up exactly zero secrets about the creepy town they've all found themselves trapped in. But what else is there to do? The fog keeps them trapped and they've seen what it can do to people, and without communications to any outside world...

She's honestly starting to wonder if an outside world even exists here anymore.

Sighing, she returns the latest pile of park permit applications to the desk where she'd found them and stands, stretching her arms up over her head and wincing as the motion reminds her that she's still injured. Strips of grey cloth cover the palms of her hands and wrists, wrapped tightly enough to serve in place of a bandage, disappearing under the sleeves of her sweater. Mathias has not been kind to her in the weeks since her arrival. Picking up her coat, she makes her way to the front of the building, turning a corner into the front reception hall—

And freezing in shock at the sight of the person standing there. ] Agent Hill. Not a face I was expecting to see here.

[ It doesn't matter who Maria Hill technically works for now, she'll always be an Agent of SHIELD in Daisy's book. ]

I am RUSTED ALL TO HELL

[swordofshield]

[ She starts to turn at the sound of someone's approach, hand going to her empty holster, battlefield calm settling in where shock was a moment before.

She doesn't so much as blink when the younger woman says her name. It's not like she's an unknown factor to those within SHIELD's ranks, and there are more agents that she doesn't know than ones she does.

The once-over Daisy gets is little more than a glance, one that takes in the wrappings around her palms and wrists. Interesting but not so remarkable as to be worth comment, yet. ]

That makes two of us. Agent...?

RUST JUST ADDS CHARACTER

[chuju]

[ That gut reaction isn't surprising in the least, and Daisy's glad for perhaps the first time that this place stripped them of their weapons. If it hadn't, she'd have a gun pointed at her by one of the agency's best. While she'd never had the pleasure of meeting Hill in person, there's a reason the woman had been Fury's right hand for so long.

She stays where she is for now, letting the other woman get her bearings before she moves any closer. ]

Johnson. Daisy Johnson. But you might know me as Skye.

[ It feels weird to offer that last bit of information, but if by some chance Hill is from around the same time as Coulson, then she wouldn't know the name Daisy had taken as her own while they'd rebuilt SHIELD from the ground up. If she is from before all of that though... Well, Hill had helped track Ward down when he'd taken her and the Bus. ]

[swordofshield]

I'm afraid I don't know you as either.

[ But she still doesn't read as a threat. Maria crosses her arms, glancing back at the bulletin board. She indicates the note with Coulson's name with a gesture. ] Did you put that up?

[chuju]

[ That... what? Blinking, there's no keeping the confusion from her face as she looks between Hill and the board, noting the indicated paper with the same tension she'd felt the first time she'd seen it. ]

No, I didn't. [ And then she moves finally, walking to the board and tugging the paper from its pin. She doesn't look at it, and her voice is tight when she explains. ] This is old. He's fine.

[ Though not for lack of trying. ]

[swordofshield]

[ Maria blinks. That's as much of a tell as Daisy gets, as much as Maria shows she's bracing herself to share bad news. ] No. It's accurate. Phil Coulson is dead. He was a casualty of the attack on New York.

[ Which is close enough to the truth to be acceptable for a stranger. ]

[chuju]

[ The only response Daisy gives is to stare at Hill in silence for a long moment that seems to stretch into hours. Her expression is completely blank, as if she isn't sure what to feel or how to respond, but then the gears start slowly turning again and she just—

Sighs, with a weariness she feels in her bones. ] Okay, I guess we're doing this then.

[ Turning, she leans back against bulletin board, making sure to keep an arm's distance between herself and that blood-stained map. She feels ancient as she reaches up to press a hand against her eyes before letting her arm fall to her side again. Might as well just rip off the bandaid and get it over with. ]

I'm from the year 2019. Coulson is alive; he was brought back after the Battle of New York through Project TAHITI, on Fury's orders. Coulson recruited me for his team about a year after that.

[blindninja]

Uh... hey. [His voice is quiet, almost echoes in the quietness of the town hall. If he had seen anything, tasted the blood dried and crackled over the cuts in her layers of skin, felt the way she studied the notes on the bulletin board all penned by various hands, heard her confusion and surprise, he doesn't let any of it show on his face. All that remains on his face is a twitch of a smile and a pair of shades obscuring a slow blink, once, and then twice.]

I'm sorry, I don't recognise your voice. Are you-... you may be in the wrong apartment.

[swordofshield]

[ Maria turns, reading what those glasses mean and pressing her lips together in a grimace that's more neutral an expression than most people could pull off. Still, she keeps her voice as gentle as it ever gets. ]

Did you just wake up here?

[blindninja]

Yeah, of course. I-- [He reaches over to his right and his hand moves over thin air. Pausing, he tips his head to one side and his eyebrows knot above the bridge of his nose. It takes him another moment after doing it again before he takes a couple of small steps towards her, raising both hands.]

Oh. Oh I'm-- I'm so sorry. I'm in the wrong apartment. [He presses his hand flat against his chest before holding it out to face her again.] I must have-- God, oh, I uh-- This... [The tip of his tongue flickers over his upper lip nervously.] I'm. S-sorry.

[He can't hear as well as he used to, but it's enough to get a read of their present situation. She genuinely doesn't know who he is. They're both confused. He flashes her a sheepish smile, probing her further.]

I need to get back to West 44th Street. The Hell's Kitchen end. Do you mind calling me a cab?

[swordofshield]

I'm afraid we're not in New York. Or an apartment complex, for that matter.

[ She hasn't let her guard down yet. Honestly, she doesn't plan to any time soon, but she can't help herself. She can't believe that the first person she meets in this creepy-ass nowhere town after waking up in the snow is going to be completely or even relatively helpless. There's been way too much weird in the past week for that. Someone faking blindness is so far down on her list of impossibilities right now. ]

As far as I can tell there hasn't been any vehicular traffic in this town at least since it started snowing.

[blindninja]

Ah. I guess this is shaping up to be... a bit of a weird morning. [She's familiar with New York City at least. That's an okay starting point. At this juncture he's thinking she would be more the type of person Wilson Fisk would have dispatched to take care of him. But the strangeness of what's written on the board and the little bits of information he has been able to glean from outside has him thinking it's possible that she's part of the Hand.]

...any idea where we are? Or how we got here? [He chews on his bottom lip and takes a couple of steps towards her, rocking left and right with each step, rubbing his hand against his thigh feigning awkwardness and nervousness.]

I've-- never left New York City. It's... oddly quiet.

hi I'm screaming

[40seconds]

[ It's been a few days, and while they haven't been bad days exactly, what Coulson wants more than anything is to just spend a day in the boardinghouse with nothing but a cup of strong coffee for company. Well, that and whoever might happen to come in or out of the boardinghouse. He might need a break, but he's not reclusive.

Either way, he still has things to do before he can do that, so he finds himself back at town hall. It's the unofficial headquarters for his and John Constantine's efforts at information gathering, and, well, it's become the place he spends most of his time.

Today, though, there's someone new at the bulletin board, but when he gets closer, he realizes he knows just who she is, and frankly, he's relieved and glad to see her. ]

Well, now there's someone I didn't expect to see.

rubs hands together

[swordofshield]

[ It's automatic, her reaction to the approach of an unknown factor in a strange place. One hand to her empty holster, one hand to a belt that doesn't have a knife. She's oriented on the sound before the impossibility of the voice really hits her.

And then it does hit her, and it's like getting thrown into a wall. For a moment, just a moment, her expression is naked with grief, and then she's snatched up one of the pens from next to the bulletin board and is holding it in much the same way she would hold that knife, if she had it. A pen is hardly an effective weapon, but she can still leave it sticking out of this bastard's eye. ]

You have three seconds to drop his face, or I swear, I don't care what you are, I'll put you down.

[40seconds]

[ Honestly, if she reacted any other way, Coulson would have been disappointed. He knows that Maria is among the best of the best, and if he'd been thinking, he wouldn't have walked up on her like that. He chalks that off to his general state of being tired of this entire town, but any relief and happiness at seeing her quickly disappears, because that is certainly a pen she's brandishing like one would brandish a weapon.

Quickly raising his hands in what he hopes is a placating gesture, he tries to come up with a satisfactory explanation. ]

Well, you see, that would be a little hard to do, because- [ Well, he's not quite sure how to finish that sentence, but he tugs on the sides of his face a little bit, as if that'll somehow help. He knows it won't, because Loki's brand of shapeshifting wasn't something pulled off like one would remove a mask. ]

I know what you're thinking, but I'm really not a shapeshifting god who just so happens to be wearing the face of your friend.

[ He hopes "friend" is a word that applies, anyway. At least he likes to think that they're more than just two people who happen to work for the same agency. ]

[swordofshield]

[ God, and isn't that such a Phil thing to do? Tugging at his face like that. It would break her heart if she let it, so she doesn't. It just becomes further ammunition tamped down into the weapon she's prepared to make of herself if he comes an inch closer.

He's not wrong, about her considering him a friend. Maria's whole conception of the idea of friendship is complicated. But somehow, Phil Coulson managed to make it past the moat of acceptable losses and onto the solid ground of her regard. ]

It would be a pretty stupid move, all things considered. [ The pen doesn't waver an iota. ] The fact that his brother dragged him away muzzled a day and a half ago is a point in your favor, at least as far as Loki is concerned.

[ Of course, that doesn't mean he isn't something else. ]

[40seconds]

[ It is, which is why he did it. But that doesn't solve the problem either because if he actually was Loki impersonating himself (he's not, but boy, this is such a head spinner to think about), then he would have all his usual mannerisms.

And he's not planning on coming closer, because he can see that she's on edge, and he doesn't want to give her any reasons to attack him with that pen. ]

Well, I'm going to take that point, at least, and I know you're not going to believe what I have to tell you, but- I have to tell you. There's no way around it.

[ He sighs and then he looks around. ]

Do you mind if we sit down? You can still keep that pen on me, but this could take awhile.

[swordofshield]

[ Her glance goes to the nearest chair. She really needs to invest in a tool belt like Natasha's. One that has a ready stock of zipties and things to electrocute people. ]

You're more than welcome to sit.

[ She'll stay right here with her pen thank you. ]

[40seconds]

You sure? This isn't going to be a short conversation.

[ But he knows better than to press the issue, so he just pulls over a chair and takes a seat. ]

How much do you know about Project TAHITI?

[ It's obviously classified, and probably above her authorization level, but it's just the opener to this conversation. ]

i hear we need enabling?

[notanemptymotto]

This place certainly does ring the bells of a horror novel, doesn't it?

[ Meta fun? Yes, let's have some meta fun!

Helen steps from the hallway that leads into the reception area of Town Hall. She offers a smile, brunette hair around her shoulders, and a hot cup of the worst cup of tea she has ever had. Still, it fairs far better than coffee. ]

It seems as if new people do filter in every now and then.

i'm so easily enabled tho

[swordofshield]

I'm sure there's a Poe reference to be made somewhere.

[ He had a whole poem about bells, didn't he? Something like that. She has no idea.

Maria keeps her expression neutral, not returning the smile, but not openly hostile either. The tea suggests a certain amount of relaxation, or at least familiarity with their surroundings. The information about newcomers shows at least some knowledge of what's going on. ]

I'm afraid you're going to need to elaborate. New to what?

well, let's get crackin

[notanemptymotto]

Hmm. Or maybe even Stephen King.

[ Don't the lovely English woman--even if her accent sounds very far traveled. She nods to the way she had just come. ]

The town. This is Mathias... from what I've been told? It was once a fishing town, but, how long ago seems to be up for debate. We believe its somewhere in the New England area.

Would you like something warm to drink?

[swordofshield]

Never liked his endings.

[ She turns away from the bulletin board to give Helen her full regard. Helen and the rest of their surroundings, anyway.

...God, the idea of a cup of coffee is heaven right now. Even a bad cup of coffee. ]

You'll forgive a little paranoia regarding ingested sedatives, I hope. I can't remember how I got here, which is never a positive sign.

[notanemptymotto]

They certainly were ones left to be desired.

[ She shakes her head. ]

I'd say that paranoia is something needed in a place like this. An abandoned town with no way out of it? It's bloody terrible, really.

It seems we all arrived her through different places and times. I was on a rooftop before I woke up in the snow. Honestly, I thought I fell into it.