Test Drive Meme #4

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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: Think of the Children

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 the Sylphid have a new clutch of sparks, the name for their infant form, that are ready to be properly born and introduced into society. The problem? There is a component that is vital for their birth that's been stolen by a group of jungle-dwelling rebels who took it to a small encampment. These rebels have been causing endless troubles for your concerned hosts, and this is the worst thing they've done yet.

If you don't retrieve the components necessary for the birth of the clutch of infant sparks, those sparks will die.

The new recruits will be led by an attendant into a large room adjoining the banquet room to find a large map of the area projected onto a table, and plenty of simple dry-erase markers to go around that can be used to mark the surface of the map, in a staggering array of colors so that everyone has a different one to illustrate any ideas they might have. On the table itself, a location outside of the city, which is partly illustrated to one side of the table, there is a red circle built into the projection that highlights the outpost where the components of spark birth are being held. Further to the west of that is a much larger settlement labeled "Witches Camp."

The attendant quickly explains the details of the board, indicating where they're located now (a small outpost to the southwest of the city) and where the outpost they're planning to raid to return the components is. The attendant goes on to explain that while they have a rough plan, to take hover-ATVs and other vehicles to the settlement, swarm it, and return their goods, they could use the input of the new arrivals to improve the plan.

"Consider it your first test." says the attendant, with a smile, "If you have any ideas for how to approach, make them known."

iii. The Mission: Retrieving The Components

Once the planning has been completed, it's time for the mission itself. The attendant, while not rushing anyone, has definitely been encouraging people to be quick to finish planning, as the mission is urgent and the sparks are dying as they speak. All input has, however, been taken, and the new recruits are invited by the attendant to visit the hangar, where they can choose their vehicles to transport themselves to the outpost in question. There are a variety of vehicles, from two-seater hover-ATVs that characters are encouraged to use in teams to larger 'dune buggy' style vehicles to a couple of large transport trucks intended to bring back the components that have been stolen.

Characters are welcome to follow the simple plan that the Sylphid made up in that room - to take the vehicles and overwhelm the rebels with numbers, to take back the components necessary. But they are also encouraged to enact their own plans, whether it's stealth and infiltration or straight up weapons-toting warrior badassery.

Once the group gets to the outpost they will find themselves faced with a small outpost containing only about 10 small buildings and one central building that obviously serves as a central gathering place. One of the other 10 buildings is more secure than the others, obviously the place where they keep supplies and most likely the components needed for spark birth that they've stolen. There are about 60 rebels in the compound, all very well-armed, some with weapons both magical and technological, some with magic, and some with supernatural abilities. Some are armed with both abilities and weapons. This won't be an easy fight, as the rebels are hardened, well-armed, and used to raids on this particular outpost.

On top of that, there will be a rebel supply delivery happening shortly after the battle begins, which will bring in backup in the form of rebels from the larger settlement that are equally well-armed and accustomed to fighting. These arriving rebels are also tasked with bringing the components of spark birth back to the larger settlement, the Witches Camp, which is to the southwest of this small outpost by about a half-day's ride through the jungle.

Characters currently in the game can either be with the invading force, or be coming to bring supplies in this drop-off, playing either the part of Sylphid allies or rebel forces protecting the outpost.

Either way, once the new recruits allied with the Sylphid manage to break into the secure building, all they will find is racks of supplies - food, water, medical supplies, and entertainment items - and a makeshift living area outfitted with bunks, a card table with cards on it, and a small 'kitchen' consisting of camp stoves and ice boxes. In that living area? People. People just like the new recruits, from a variety of worlds and planets, alien and human alike.

Once a new recruit makes it to that building and see the inside, the simulation will end for them.

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