annexedmeme | Test Drive Meme #3

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!test drive meme

Test Drive Meme #3

Test Drive Info

⇝ Test Drive Memes take place in a virtual reality simulation occurring in characters' minds that tests them for 'fitness' before they enter the setting officially. Because it is set in a simulation created by the Sylphid, the missions, while being comparable to regular missions in the game, will be from a Sylphid perspective.
⇝ Characters will not be chipped during the simulation, and will have access to their abilities from canon, but will be chipped upon waking for the rescue.
⇝ Current characters can easily be pulled into the simulation if they are sleeping and dreaming when it's happening. The Sylphid cast a wide net with the simulation to fill it out with characters to interact with for prospective new arrivals.
⇝ Test Drive Meme threads may be considered game canon so long as all parties agree to it.
⇝ Test Drive Meme threads do count for Activity Check.

i. Awakening

It happens in a dream. You fall asleep and the next moment you feel like you're awakening again, but without any exhaustion, as if you've had a full night's sleep. You find yourself in a comfortable bed in a room full of comfortable beds, all of which contain other people waking up just the way you are. The room is large but cozy, with wide windows that are framed by light curtains, and the sun is shining in from an angle that suggests morning.

Once you're up and moving around a little, ready to explore this new place, you'll discover an open door on one of the walls in the room, through which soft strains of music can be heard, and above which there's a sign saying "Free Breakfast." Once you make your way into the room, possibly with some of the other people just waking up in this strange place, you find a buffet table loaded with breakfast foods - some familiar, and some strange, mainly featuring mushrooms and root vegetables. Quiet, soothing music is playing and there are a variety of tables with chairs available to settle down and enjoy some food.

This is just a dream, right? What could be the harm in eating a bit of food, maybe trying out some cool alien cuisine, and getting to know the other people here?

ii. The Mission: The Fungus Among Us

Once everyone has eaten their fill and gotten to know their new compatriots a little better, there is an interruption in the music playing in the room. Three musical chimes sound, and a pleasant female voice speaks.

Attention, new recruits! We have a mission for you.

The intercom goes on to explain that there is a forest of mushrooms called The Troop that borders on the northwest walls of the city, which releases spores near constantly (though more prolific in fall) that have a hallucinogenic effect on sentient beings. These spores can cause people traveling in The Troop to become disoriented and confused, experience vivid auditory and visual hallucinations, and become permanently lost. Generally, the spores aren't a problem inside the city or in the surrounding area because no one has built close enough to the Troop to suffer serious effects. However, this particular fall, the spore count has been significantly higher than previous years, and spores are making their way into the neighborhoods bordering The Troop. Even worse, the spores are having a slightly different effect on top of the usual ones.

The spores, once inhaled, are growing into microscopic fungi that populate in the brains of citizens and take over the brains of the infected. Once taken over, the citizens who are infected are servants of The Troop, and will do whatever they can to infect others by whatever means possible, whether it's by capturing spores and releasing them in people's faces or by gagging up fungi that will infect others. Beyond that, there is a kind of mania about the people who have been infected - they are wide-eyed and high-energy, they will accost random people with spores or fungi, they will chase people down on the street to infect them.

Beyond that, there's another effect. Those inflicted with fungal infection become distinctly lacking in any kind of verbal filter. They will say exactly what they're thinking, they will blurt out secrets, expose themselves emotionally, and share their innermost thoughts and dreams. After all, it's not like the individual mushrooms in The Troop keep secrets, they're all part of a larger whole, and that's how infected individuals will behave. It's as if they're sharing a consciousness, taken over by the hive mind of The Troop, and see others as simply extensions of themselves.

Will your character get infected, try to help the infected somehow, or just plain stay out of the way of all this madness?

iii. The Mission: Full Fungal Smackdown

As the infection gradually progresses, those who are infected start to become more violent, which is a big problem. The infection is slowly spreading throughout the low-income neighborhood that it initiated in and moving toward the city proper, with increasingly aggressive infected doing their best to infect others. Their methods are starting to become more aggressive as well, where before they would simply spray others with spores or present them with mushrooms, they are now altering common devices like leaf blowers to spread the spores over a broader area and violently attacking people to shove mushrooms into people's mouths, curling fingers inside their mouths to force the fungi into their victims' sinuses and infect them.

It isn't just infection techniques that are getting more aggressive. Their behavior in general is aggressive - the infected are starting fights, are attacking people, often shouting in a strange, unintelligible language. The tone of the attack is that of people defending their own territory, fighting off intruders or predators, even if the person they're attacking made no moves to strike first. Attackers may fight hand-to-hand or even employ weapons that they are familiar with to attack others, whether it's guns, knives, laser swords, or anything else they might use in their regular uninfected life. Even those who were non-combatants will use kitchen knives or other makeshift weapons to attack the uninfected.

They never attack the infected, somehow they seem to know immediately who is and who isn't part of the hivemind.

As the attacks start to really escalate and there is panic in the streets, characters will be informed that a cure for the infection has been found, and everyone who isn't infected should stop by one of the Sylphid trucks carrying syringes of the cure and load up. Anyone who's able to fight, or even who is just capable of carrying and using a syringe, is asked to take a bandeau of them and to inoculate anyone infected. Unfortunately, though, the only real way to tell if someone is infected is by that wide-eyed look, and the attack that comes out of nowhere.

iv. Welcome to the Broken World.

The simulation is over, and you don't even know how you got here from there.

All you know is that one moment you were participating in a mission to save the Sylphid children, to uphold peace talks, and then you were asleep again, after the mission was over.

You wake up in what seems like the blink of an eye, nauseous and dizzy but otherwise unscathed, possessions taken away, barefoot and dressed only in a set of plain grey clothing, like the most bland uniform ever imagined, in an empty room with empty walls and one single door with a small barred window and a single number printed just above it. The door is locked and cannot be broken by any means, you can feel your connection with any superhuman powers you had severed, leaving them just out of reach - you can feel them there, tingling at your fingertips or in the back of your brain, but you just can't get to them. There is no one to greet you or explain what's happening. You start to lose track of time, the only sound the distant ticking of what sounds like a massive clock.

Just when things seem hopeless, when you feel like you're about to go mad, there's the sound of a commotion outside your door. The sounds of a battle, or perhaps an infiltration gone just slightly wrong. Either way, when the door opens, there is a figure there with a hand outstretched.

"Welcome to the Broken World. Come on, we'll explain everything just as soon as we get you and the others out of here."

NAVIGATION

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The lenses are tinted red but it's possible to see into them, Vader's irises red-rimmed gold inside. Occasionally the HUD reflects on his pale skin.

"You need to cover your mouth and nose." Without question he tore his shirt, the cloth large enough to cover her lower face and tied. It's not ideal but it's better than nothing. His saber is on his hip. It's very similar to one he's given her once.

"Stay close, I'll see you to safety." He wants to rage against this. This mockery. But on the chance she's really here...

If it is mockery someone will pay later.

Those eyes give her a clue - she knows them. But they were never that color. They were blue once and - She closes her eyes tightly as he ties the cloth around her head. Now isn't the time to fall to pieces.

"Anakin..." she whispers, grabbing onto his arm. He is a Sith. A Sith Lord. She has seen those golden yellow eyes before and she just has one question.

"When?"

Was it after she died? Guilt rises within her, making each step she takes feel heavy.

"Do you have a blaster?" she can handle one of those and at least help. She has never been a good victim.

He doesn't tell her Anakin Skywalker is dead. Not her. Anyone else? Yes. But not her.

He can't even answer before he can sense the guilt. "Later-" he stumbles for a moment, knowing what he could do to steady her. Knowing he would have to anyone else. "New isn't the place for big emotions Padmè." He couldn't do it.

She was his exception. To so many things.

He pulled the blaster out, different than their but not terribly so. "Safety. Power settings. Charge count." He quickly showed her, then handed it over. It was, currently, set to a painful blast - not meant to render unconscious but solicit an answer.

To her, he will never die. She holds him in her heart and her memories. That love - that bond - miraculously lives on in their children; in Luke especially. Padmé would have come to Vader if she had been alive. In a heartbeat. Their son has to instead.

"Probably not." she agrees, nodding at his lesson about the blaster. Ironically, she doesn't have much problem stunning those infected if it means protecting him.

Maybe she is a fool. But he has come to enough harm. She can see that and hear it in his breathing.

"The higher we climb, I hear, the safer we will be."

He's lying to himself of course. But he repeats it regardless. Even if their family had learned to ignore his protestations.

"That would make sense. I'm slower than I used to be." Longer legs helped but couldn't make up for the lack of agility and speed. "Higher ground would be back the way I came." Just not the exact path behind him.

Because of the bodies.

"You have me. We will figure it out." Padmé can't carry him - or she would! But they can find a path that is easier for him to trek. Like hell is she leaving him behind.

"I see you left a...trail." she winces, empathizing with the poor infected, but also understanding how useless it is to argue with them. Maybe death is better.

Setting off in that direction, she does her best to not step on anyone.

He needn't be carried, but he also can't pick her up and leap about the jungle anymore.

It's kinder, and he was quick, but kindness hadn't been his goal. Nor did he think them real.

Vader leads from the side, lightsaber used often to clear underbrush and vines. Or to fell small trees and large ferns to make it more difficult to be followed. "The highest points are away from the Troop as well." He'd had time to explore.

He doesn't need to do that, either. Just being beside him feels good and Padmé finds that she has more strength than she thought.

For her family, she will do anything.

"You've looked around." she isn't surprised, "How long have you been here?"

Not here, exactly. This place feels...strange. Real and yet not at the same time. Maybe that's why she isn't as upset about being violent with the infected.

"Over three months. Although this is...not real. This." He toed at the ground. "I'm dreaming. You...don't feel like a dream." The others did. They must mean she was here.

Had she left? Had she not? If they'd had her...

"The mountain areas get steep." It made him stop to look at her footwear - fashion or practical?

"I don't know what I am." she answered honestly, "I feel solid, but you're right, none of this seems real."

The jungle. The infected. She had been in a haze when she first woke, but now that haze is lifting.

Practical. She is wearing the boots she wore on Mustafar. The white robe she had died in had been traded for simple clothes - a tunic and comfortable pants.

"I can manage." she squeezes his arm comfortingly, "Remember all of the places we visited? If I can't handle a little mountain, I'm not the woman you married."

The jungle was real enough, at least it actually exists he knew. But he'd not heard of the Troop doing this. It made him think they were planning to do something and testing their own ability to contain a problem.

The boots he recognized. It was uncomfortable, but only due to the strong memory of them thudding against metal and lava-hard rocks.

Vader nodded, even if he was still worried. The wildlife here child be dangerous but must seemed too recognize the superior predator in their midst. "Under normal circumstances I wouldn't be concerned." These were not normal.

What better way to learn your own capabilities than through tests? What does it matter if real people suffer? It sounds very like the Sith.

"When have we had normal circumstances?" she arches a brow at him, challenging him with the might of her five foot four inches. He has always towered over her, but now it's a little ridiculous.

"If this is a dream or a simulation, what happens will be undone when it ends, right?" she pushes her way through vegetation and toys with the Japor snippet around her neck.

If does but this is worse he feels.

"Semi-normal. It still isn't this." His hearing picked up what was still too far away for her's - fighting getting closer. "Let's keep moving."

"It should. But we don't know the Slyphid's full capabilities." It was a steep learning curve. He tended too do alright with those - so did she. But this was something more dangerous.

"What do you hear?" she tenses and quickens her steps, doing her best to keep up with his strides, "We likely never will. All we can do is learn from their actions and reactions."

He has the right to feel nervous. She should agree with him on that point and feel likewise, but...

Everything is still numb.

"Fighting. Off to seven twenty, seven twenty-five." He defaulted to pilot jargon, zero dead ahead of him, six 180 degrees from that. "Fifty, sixty meters." He could get a much closer read - though his HUD and the Force but it wasn't needed yet. "Three pairs of feet." Given the intergalactic nature of this place that could be two to four individuals.

"We have a similar species on Geonosis which is an advantage." Until he knew this wasn't them using her to mine him for information he wouldn't say more.

She isn't a pilot - not a serious one like him anyway - but she gets a picture of how close they are to danger. He has fought here, the bodies attest to that, but she doesn't want him forced into battle anymore. It's not good for him.

"All I remember about Geonosis was that droid factory." she rubs at a stitch in her side, "The one where you were almost sliced to pieces and I was almost turned into molten metal."

Oh and the arena. That...brings up painful memories.

Edited 2022-12-05 14:14 (UTC)

Fighting is one of the few things that allow him to hold onto his sanity. It's not something he can let go of, at this point.

"Second Battle of Geonosis. We didn't know how close we were to the real danger the first time." Which said something because how many times has she ever known him to bring up Geonosis that wasn't him screaming in a nightmare?

"Stay close, I'll get us to higher ground." A cave, he thinks. Even a shallow one, would be more defensible and protect her.

"We rarely know." Padmé has learned that just by being married to him. The danger in him was always simmering in a place she couldn't reach.

"Ani..." she pauses for a moment, leaning her back against a tree, "I gave birth less than a day ago. I'm slowing you down." she isn't even sure if she should be moving around like this, "I can find a place to hide and wait this out."

It's not like she is planning on dying easily. She has a good reason to survive. He's here and he needs her.

"The Force should have granted a mode clear vision." Whatever else was lost at the idea he'd leave her behind.

"What? No." She'd given birth a day ago - she hadn't pregnant here, although as best his math could figure out, that has been a very close thing. Had she been sent back? They could do that. Even more he was determined to get their technology. "No." He doesn't mean to glare at her but he is, harshly. Still seeing her lean like that, he tried to think. Decent slavers tended too give at least a few days, some a week, before returning this having just given birth to manual labor. Maybe she shouldn't be doing this. He still wasn't leaving her. Instead he leaned over, wrapping his arm under her hips to lift her up to lean against him. To hold her in almost a bridal carry. "Hold onto me."

She'd be able to get her arm around his neck anyway and the dome would protect her arm.

"There must be a reason. We might not know until we become one with it." Padmé sets her lips in a stubborn line when she senses his glare, "No? Carrying yourself and that suit up a mountain is difficult enough. Believe me, I have no desire to die."

The chance to be with him, to maybe see their children... No. The infected will have a fight on their hands. She has excellent aim with a blaster - he knows that much about her already.

But then he is picking her up. His stubbornness reminds her of...Anakin. Her Anakin. With a sob, she wraps her arms around him, hoping that some of her warmth reaches him.

"I can hold on."

"You aren't going to add a burden to me." This suit was lighter than his old one and he'd had practice with it.

Her sob stabs at him, and he holds her close and securely, protective and stubborn all at once. Having her with him, needing him to get her away from danger, will push him faster he knows. And he's able to abandon an idea of taking his temper out on the infected beings due to it.

Instead he pushes himself to move, pushing a path difficult to travel without opening it up too much with his saber, heading up and east toward the rocky slopes, without losing his footing. Or struggling with her.

Sith Lord or Jedi, Anakin is Anakin. She feels guilty for weighing him down, though, in reality, even pregnant, she was small enough to be carried with relative ease. Her guilt probably has more to do with failing him...leaving him. She hadn't wanted to or meant to. So she holds onto him tight now, amazed at his strength.

And she makes a promise to herself - like he has always taken care of her, she will take care of him.

"They are beautiful." she speaks softly after awhile, "I saw them. Luke and Leia."

Even heavily pregnant, the trick of carrying Padmè wasn't about her weight but about balance and ensuring she wasn't so bent as to have her breathing compromised.

Now it was just protecting her from their would be attackers and the foliage of the jungle.

Her words cut him, stab him in the heart anew. "I haven't the slightest doubt they were. I am glad you got to see them." For a moment he thought about his cape and how much easier it would be to protect her if he had it. Anything to distract himself from blurting out Luke being here. Leia had been.

Conversation for not now.

In the distance he could hear an animal bellow and a human voice scream. One of the large tusked herbivores must have met some of the infected. That would attract the roving pack of felines.

He sharply turned from that direction and kept pressing higher.

She should have known she was carrying twins with how large her belly grew. Even walking around near the end had been complicated. She had put aside her duties, then, and tried to focus on the last days before they held their son or daughter.

But Anakin had needed her more and she had run to him, triggering a slightly early delivery.

"I wish you had been able to see them. I heard the midwife droid say they were healthy." and that was all she needed to hear, "I could see you in both of their faces."

The sounds concern her and she grips the blaster tighter, ready to fire and protect his back.

She maybe should have known - her sister had twins, after all, but also he didn't understand why the meddroid hadn't told her.

"So do I." There was rare regret in his voice, not being with her had been a long-standing guilt of his. Not being with her and their children, not having a say in their fates, not being there. "Leia looks so much like you. I don't know how I didn't see it right away." Because he hadn't thought their child(ren) lived. So he didn't look (or listen).

He could feel her moving, hear the blaster whine. He wasn't worried about her missing if she needed to fire, and even if she wasn't a skilled shot, he could manage - the goal at this point was evasion, as much as he wasn't normally one to turn from a fight. The goal in this case wasn't a victory over a battle, but safety and information.

"We'll be all right."

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