The Village Mod (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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villagememes2021-03-08 05:08 pm
villagemod) wrote in villagememes2021-03-08 05:08 pm
Entry tags:
test drive — spring
SPRING 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.
Prospective players are welcome to play with any of the established locations within Mathias.( Recommended listening: ♫ )
GHOSTS OF THE LIVING
The fog moves in quickly and without warning, not from the waterfront but the forest, cascading through every street in a thick wave of white. It is not a soft blanket enveloping the town, but a heavy weight pressing down, threatening to suffocate as the sky is blotted out and no one can see more than ten feet in any direction.
Those who are outside when it rolls in are left wandering blind, hoping that a randomly chosen direction will lead them to shelter or another living soul. There are perhaps even those who were lucky enough to already be inside when the fog descended, quickly closing doors and windows to keep it from creeping in. Wherever they are, the residents of Mathias will soon notice that they are not the only ones in the fog.
Anyone out in the fog is left disoriented, possibly losing their sense of time and place, and it is only after prolonged exposure that they will begin to feel off. A sense of being ill will cling to them if they are in the fog for too long, including dizziness, lightheadedness, or nausea — the time it takes to manifest varies from person to person, as does the duration it will last after leaving the fog.
With all of these elements at play, the first strange apparitions encountered may be assumed to be figments of addled minds, tricks played by psyches struggling to cope with the strange reality they've found themselves in. But before long, there will be no denying that the Others in the fog are real. Appearing almost wraithlike and startlingly recognizable, these figures even feel a bit like ghosts to those who can sense such things, though everyone will feel that there is something wrong about them. Truly, there are many things wrong that residents will begin to notice as they encounter more and more of the spectres that do not acknowledge their presence in any way. They simply exist, silent and subtly terrifying like so many things in this town.
Like misty ghosts of those who have been in the town at one point or another, the Others appear as those who have died or disappeared and even those currently within the town. The likeness is truly uncanny, to the point of being completely terrifying, made even more so when they realize there is no way to communicate with the Others. They do not acknowledge anyone's presence nor anything said to them. At times, they may be only one in an area, or there may be a dozen existing in the same space. There is no limit to how many people can see them — if they are there, they are seen by all.
The Others do not enter buildings and cannot be contained in any way. They can appear at one moment and be gone in the next, or they can exist in one place for hours on end. Whether standing stationary or slowly wandering throughout the town, there is no discernible purpose to them. There is something absent and distant in the way they hold themselves, the way they walk, and their expressions, as if even they cannot grasp what is happening.
A BIT OF EXPLORATION
There are plenty of places in which to get one's bearings and hide from the fog.
There are businesses on the square, nestled around and extending out from the Town Hall. There is a schoolhouse nestled by the southern treeline, not from the rather expansive makeshift cemetery at the end of Jackson Boulevard that is courtesy of a few kind residents in town. To the far north of the square is a sprawling garden, now covered in snow, and a greenhouse that once supplied the botanical shop. And to the east and west, beyond the business square, is are residential districts.
The eastern district sprawls all the way to the beach, with some houses in perfect condition and others beginning to show significant signs of age. The western district, however, is nothing but decay. From the beginnings of rot to completely collapsed and little more than a pile of proverbial bones, none of these homes are anything resembling livable. Well, as far as one can tell, at least. For between the streets of Hill Lane and Stine Road there is a crack in the earth. A dozen feet across and fifty feet down, there is no way across.
TO SEE AND BE SEEN
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. Covering the board are tacked-on 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 painted directly across the center of the board, visible in the gaps between the pieces of paper, is a symbol in dark red. While peering at that obscured symbol, a strange breeze ruffles the papers, revealing a little more, just enough to—
An eye. A strange, ornate eye with three lobes, painted in still-wet red. And upon close examination, a keen eye will realize that the paint is actually blood, perhaps even human.
The longer someone stands there, the more it will feel like they are being watched, even studied, with great interest. It's a sensation that lingers and stays with them even when they exit the building.
Ghosts;
Not being one to stay in the house, Raylan had been caught by the fog running in to cover town like it was digging up state secrets. Shit I wish, he thought to himself at the internal analogy - Always knowing to little should have been Mathis's byline. Caught but no longer naïve enough to panic, Raylan started back towards the first open, non-rotted building he could find and hoped it had a phone. At least he'd be able to tell the house where he was.
Down side to fog this thick, you don't see someone until you're nearly on top of them. By the time Raylan saw the man in black, there was no stopping himself being noticed unless the guy was really dense and unaware. It was illogical but something about people who wore capes suggested that unaware was probably not in the cards for luck. There was a sudden gripping fear that Mathis had finally nutted up and manifested the Shadow Man into a more palatable form.
It was enough to make Raylan take half a step back, but that was as far as he'd let it push him. If today was the day he was going to get to hit whatever brought them here, he was going to fucking take it.. Once he was sure and because there was literally nothing else someone like him could do against that. But when the guy turned around, he looked real enough. So did the Others. Raylan kept his eyes narrow, chin lifting in an automatic subtle kind of defiance, hand itching forever and once again for his goddamned gun, and almost glad he didn't have it with that kind of reaction in his lizard brain.]
Lingerin' outside too long tends to take a toll. Air's better inside- [Small testing metaphorical steps; despite his urge, he wasn't trying to jump the gun.]
no subject
It's a miracle he doesn't send forth what little shadow there is to attack the other man out of surprise. He's far too disoriented, and while he's by no means weak (he refuses to even think of himself as such a word), he's overly cautious. Or maybe he's just so disoriented his powers aren't quite seeping through his fingers like he wants. Kirigan denies this thought as soon as it moves into his head. ]
Where? [ Inside, the other has said. But which direction? Kirigan's voice is a commmand, soft but cutting through the fog, unmistakably an order for the stranger to show him the way. His kefta, while brilliant and black and standing out among the thick whiteness (and cleaned, like his face) is still torn and cut in ways he can't yet repair. He's only been here for a day. ]
Show me.
[ If you squint, it's almost like he's asking for help. He visibly winces, another wave of dizziness flowing through him. ]
no subject
Raylan assumes that he's just built up a subtle tolerance to the physical effects of Mathis, but that wasn't to say he didn't feel them. He'd gotten practice enough in winding his way where he needed to go, dizziness and the churning of his empty, moonshine lined stomach. Nothing in, nothing out, after all.
Stepping forward, Raylan gestured to Kirigan's left. If it had been anyone else, anyone who didn't leave his neck hairs aware and nervous, Raylan would have reached out, taken an elbow. Shit, he wanted to do that now, prove the reality of a solid form, but if he as right, he also wasn't looking to get 6 weeks work of healing broken ribs for an attempt that gained him nothing.]
If you can make it without the help, it's that way. Maybe twenty yards. If you need to puke, do us all a favor and aim towards the grass instead of my boots.
[Of course, if the man couldn't make it without the help, the implication that Raylan would help was there.
He wasn't at such a mad point to be crucifying someone over a gut fear.]
no subject
This is... Common? [ He spares a glance at the man with the laissez-faire attitude, and while whatever flicker of rage or demand has left his face, he still has a fairly commanding presence. There's annoyance in his tone, but it's for the situation rather than anything. Follow him while he reaches safety, won't you, Raylan? ]
no subject
Besides, new faces tended to come with questions. Whether those questions were going to be genuine or not was something else to be decided. Raylan was equally unbothered about the stern airs, to the frustration of many stern aired men, but he kept any opinion he might have out of his offhanded, casual Kentucky slanted tones.
His authority was fractionally more subtle.]
Not common enough to track on a calendar but often enough that yeah, you.. kinda get used to feelin' like shit. Stairs should be just ahead of ya. Better to ask questions in there too, less we breathe of this shit the better.
Door won't be locked either- [He directed as they stepped up onto the porch.] I'd ask how you got here but I'm bettin' you don't know.
[If Kirigan did, now that would be a surprise. Alright, not the shadow man. For now. Until the man proved otherwise.]