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riverviewooc2017-02-19 07:56 pm
riverview: test drive meme
Welcome to Riverview's first test drive meme! Feel free to dip your toes in on the test drive meme to try out your character in the setting, play out a mission, and get samples for your application at the same time!
● Reserves are currently OPEN.
● Applications open on March 1st.
● All threads on the test drive meme can count as game canon once the game is up and running.
● TDM threads do not count for Activity Check, but they do count for Activity Bonus Points.
Feel free to use the prompts below or create your own scenario. The setting is built to be flexible, so feel free to make things up as you go.
information resources
premise ● arrival ● setting ● ask a question ● navigation
If the sky has seemed a little more yellow-green than usual for the past couple of days, there's a reason for that. Meteorologists have been warning of a particularly nasty storm blowing in from the direction of the Delta in the Southwestern part of the Abandoned City.
The Quarantine is about to be hit by a nasty typhoon, and there's a lot to be done. Whether you're helping sandbag the banks of the river, which is bound to be swollen by the storm and flooding, weatherproofing your building, or just huddling indoors for warmth and helping reassure your friends, family, or partner that everything will be okay, it's time to take action!
There's been a lot of talk around the Quarantine about the various predators and monsters outside the fence, and how they've been getting steadily more active, crowding the fences, trying to leap over them, seemingly driven by some kind of mania. There have even been increasing instances of predators that normally mind their own business attacking the fences wholesale, slamming into it over and over as if they're trying to find a weakness.
The good news? The fences have been holding. So far.
The bad news? They won't be holding for much longer.
The Perimeter Guard is in a bad way, and it's all hands on deck. They've also sent out a few of the Perimeter Guard Cadets to post up flyers around the city asking for temporary help in fighting off the beasts. So pick up whatever weapon you're best with, hop onto a truck transport, and head on over to the fences to help drive off the monsters and keep the Quarantine safe.
With a storm rolling in that's going to keep everyone indoors, that might cause power outages, and is just frankly pretty scary, a lot of the clubs, restaurants, and hotels are doing special events to keep everyone's brains occupied and flooded with endorphins.
There are flyers around the city advertising various couples activities: speed dating, dance classes, overnight pool parties, and all-expenses-paid lovers' nights in.
The catch? The great deals only count if you're a twosome. So if you don't have someone to love, hit up speed dating in the indoor courtyard of Riverview's largest mall, or grab the first person you see and take the opportunity.
After a day or two of storm activity, things are definitely not getting better: the rain is torrential, the monsters are attacking with increased energy and decreased rest times, and the distractions are starting to wear thin. Power outages happen off and on, a very rare situation in Riverview Quarantine.
The government has put out an all-points-bulletin imploring anyone with an exploratory spirit to help.
From what government science techs can tell, the storm isn't natural - after all, even the meteorologists were saying that the pressure systems seemed extremely strange. They've managed to narrow the cause to an area in the delta where the storm seems to be originating from, and are broadcasting the general location so anyone with the guts can head out into the storm and try to find the source of it.
Any characters who decide to penetrate the jungle in search of the source will find a device in the shape of a pyramid, with glowing blue edges about a day's walk into the Abandoned City. The pyramid is a malfunctioning weather control device that is causing wild pressure fluctuations and causing the storm as well as making the animals in the jungle aggressive and erratic. Characters can destroy or deactivate the device to end the storm.
This mission can be threaded out however you would like, in groups however large you would like, and more than one team can accomplish the goal.
Whether you're looking for help with a mission or just want to get to know your fellow new arrivals, your character can make a post to the network.
Or you can choose your own adventure and do something else in the setting!
no subject
[ Michael's first move is to be honest. Dancing is all about give and take. One step forward. One step back. Until someone bows out, or takes the lead.
His shoulders drop a fraction of an inch, and he turns to the side, not away, to look out over the dance floor. He's not that generous. Michael knows better than to turn his back, even if he'd had to learn it the hard way.
He looks back at him with a smile that reaches his eyes. His second move. Michael's always been more comfortable leading than following. ]
To tell you the truth, I don't even like dancing.
no subject
I'm certain you could find a young lady keen to show you the ropes.
[It isn't as if he's unattractive. If anything, the look of him puts Flint in the mind of Billy, who could've had a lady in every port from Nassau to Havana if he'd ever been so inclined.]
no subject
It wouldn't be the first time he's stepped on his own foot.
He's not ready to dance, yet. Not with a woman. Not without her. There are worlds between him and Sara, whose life he ruined, and heart he broke, but she's still the only woman on his mind.
No matter how hard he tries to forget her. For both their sakes. ]
Probably. Couldn't you?
no subject
Of course, it could be feigned. That would make it a very specific manipulation, and this man all the more dangerous for it.
He lifts a hand up, elbow cradled in its opposite, and brushes his knuckles against the bristles of his beard. It's a contemplative pose. The Thinker.]
Undoubtedly. [Since it seems they're having that sort of conversation. Back and forth. He actually thinks this young man may well be testing him.] But owing to the-- [A faint gesture out to the dance floor. He has two rings on his left hand, they glint in the light.] unfamiliarity of the dance I thought it best to abstain until I've a better grasp of the steps.
no subject
[ Michael needs a distraction. It's too easy to follow her, the memory of her laugh, the scent of her skin, the look on her face when she'd left him, to a place he doesn't have the strength to come back from.
The man in front of him couldn't be more different. Sharp like a razor. He'll be a quick study.
Michael steps back and puts some space between them. He listens to the music, finds the rhythm, and follows it with the snap of his fingers. His brain is as accurate as any metronome. He is never off-beat.
The dance is something between a waltz and a foxtrot, like nothing he'd seen outside of this room. It rises, rolls and glides. Michael follows the movement pattern in his mind like a blueprint, and maps them onto the floor with his feet. Slow at first, one at a time, before linking them together.
He closes his eyes as the arms come in, but keeps his imaginary partner faceless and sexless. It takes everything in him not to think of her. ]
Got it?
no subject
What gives him pause is how freely it's done, and how perilously close they are to inhabiting the same space for the duration of the demonstration. He doesn't step backwards, yet he arches one eyebrow, and a muscle jumps faintly in his jaw as he shifts it to one side.]
And to what do I owe this generosity?
[His tone is an absolute zero of neutrality. Nothing given or offered in the cadence of his words. That his heart is an awful cacophony somewhere between the cage of his ribs is no one's business but his own. Fight or flight. An old ache like a bone broken badly and never mended. No one alive has this fucking right of him. Fuck tests, this feels more like a dark hood and rough rope against his neck.]
no subject
Oh, there's nothing generous about it. I'm just hoping you'll feel sorry for me.
[ The corner of Michael's mouth quirks. He doesn't laugh, not out loud, but there's suggestion of it in his voice.
Dancing in front of him. Dancing for him. Either way, it feels good to move. To do something, anything, to get himself out of his head and into his body. Michael's mind is the only prison he can't escape.
He turns with measured grace, looking back over his shoulder. Their eyes meet, and he doesn't look away. ]
I'm Michael, by the way.
no subject
And you wish to barter - what, exactly, with that pity?
[It's a different era. Different worlds. Men at sea will fuck damn near anything and no one hangs for buggery over Nassau. Flint sailed into a storm once, yet this, to him, is perilous.]
no subject
[ Michael extends the invitation with his eyes, voice and hand. The cuff of his sweater slides up over his wrist to reveal a sliver of tattoo. Black ink turned blue against olive skin. ]
Just one.
no subject
Thomas entreated him to know no shame. But Thomas isn't here. That someone else would dare stand where he stood and ask this of him is an affront. And James glances down at that hand and then back up with a very slight cant to his head, expression inscrutable. He is angry, beneath the cold steel of his exterior. He is fucking furious. It's not even meant for this poor boy, but James never has been very good at containment, the anger is self-directed but in a quantity too great to have but a single target. An animal lives in him and its teeth are bared, its bite sharp.
He smooths his beard down with the pads of his fingers. God rest his fucking soul, but he'd fight everyone in this room until the whole of it was slick with viscera if he had even an ounce less restraint right now.]
Is this a common thing for you, where you're from? Men asking men to dance.
no subject
[ Michael rolls up the sleeves of his shirt to his elblows. His arms are covered in tattoos. His decision to turn against the law, society, and the world at large marks his skin, heart and soul for life.
He's a fugitive now. A criminal. A pariah, even among his own kind. A liar, thief and murderer too. Everyone he's ever loved has left him, or died trying. There was something inside of Michael that was fundamentally broken. He'd been born wrong.
His eyes slice over the other man's face as sharp as razors. Michael wants to cut him. Skin him. Peel back all the layers, and know him.
Of all the things he's done, the lies he's told, and the people he's hurt, dancing with another man would be the least of them. ]
Do I look like I care?
no subject
He can't help himself: he's incredulous. Tattoos, certainly, even in his time were a mark of the lower class or of some criminality. So, there is an assumption of kindred spirits. Something in his own nature that's given him away, known quantities. A look, perhaps, or the scars on his hands. The hard set to his jaw and brow, the utter lack of fear or wonderment. Flint does not hide that he's a dangerous man, but most consider it cause for intrigue or avoidance, rarely a consideration of like minds.
But the presentation is markedly juvenile. Would that apathy were the cure for consequence, he'd have stood outside all the laws of men now for a decade, unmired in the frivolity of it all. The ground is even more uncertain here, in this untenable place, where nothing is yet known by rote. Recklessness without obvious gain is something he does not care to abide.
And the implication: that such things are still illegal, still shameful, still looked down upon is itself unspeakably infuriating. He is not a hopeful man, but God more than once he'd thought that in another time or place the three of them could have had an honest life together--
He scoffs in seeming, almost sympathetic amusement, shakes his head and then reaches out to pat the man on the shoulder, left-handed. His touch is measured: not light, not bruising. It also puts him in an incredibly good position to pull him forward into the blade of a knife, should he feel it necessary.]
I applaud your [a sharp, calculated pause.] audacity. But you'll not find me an appropriate partner.
no subject
[ Michael's eyes don't stray to the man's hand, heavy on his shoulder, and close to his throat. He's not going to acknowledge the threat. Even as his heart rattles against his ribs like a bird in a cage, his face remains impassive. His cool smile matches the steel in his eyes.
Ever since his arrival Michael's been herded, lectured and assigned. He needs to reclaim his agency, if only to prove to himself, and the world, that he still has any.
Michael takes a step forward, fingers curling in towards his palms. He's scared, of this place, of what it means to be here, of everyone around him, but so is this man. If he wasn't, he wouldn't be so dangerous. ]
Call it a hunch, but I think out of everyone here, you and I are two of a kind. Neither of us came here to dance.
no subject
That's a very broad assumption to make of someone you've only just met.
no subject
[ Michael steps out of his way, calling his bluff. The dance floor is all his. His eyes linger on the other man's face before falling away. He rolls his sleeves back down, and folds his arms over his chest. ]
Plenty of appropriate partners to choose from, now that you know how.
no subject
The assumption to which I was referring was us being similar.
[He'll cop to the fact he isn't interested in dancing. Not here, not with these people. Strangers, all. Listening to their idle chatter better serves his purpose.]
no subject
[ He laughs. Softly, and with a smile. Michael knows how to take a punch.
Just because he'd shared a little truth doesn't mean he's owed any. If anything, he'd done it for himself. Because he doesn't want to lie anymore, even if he should. If he were brave enough, strong enough, he would tell the truth to anyone who would listen. He's being selfish, right now, inflicting himself on this person, and if he's really taking a hard look in the mirror, for the last four years.
How long can you live in another man's shoes before they become your own? Robbing a bank, going to prison, planning an escape, none of it had been as simple as getting a tattoo and pulling on a pair of striped pajamas.
Michael has blood on his hands, his hands. He tries not to look at them often. Michael lies to a lot of people, but no one as often as himself.
His eyes scan the room, lingering on the exits. Three of them. All within equal distance from where they stand. Michael should take any one of them and go.
He doesn't, because this is the closest he's come to a real conversation since his arrival, and he's lonely and hurting. His assumption, right or wrong, had been that this man was lonely and hurting too. ]
You just looked like you were waiting for something.
no subject
As to sympathy-- well, he has never been a creature of that habit. He feels none of it here. But there is a possibility that this boy is trying less to rattle him specifically, and that he is himself rattled and can intuit enough to recognize that there are, in fact, similarities. Certainly they are both rough men. He would posit, also intelligent. But this boy seems a wreck of himself, at odds with everything he is, a cacophony of contradictions. James is too fucking old to think that such a presentation could exist without intent to manipulate, but every good lie has a truth to it, laid into its bones.
James does not like being picked apart. Silver does the same, and God help him, but Silver is one of the most dangerous men he knows. He is not afraid of making enemies, but to hold those who pose the greatest hazard to you close is the greater wisdom. His eyes narrow, calculating.
His name? Why, he very nearly says Flint.]
James.
[His tone hasn't changed. It's still distant and dispassionate. It's neither an olive branch nor an albatross, but it's plain enough.]
no subject
[ Michael extends his hand a second time. His fingers are long and slender, freshly callused, knuckles scarless.
Michael isn't a fighter. He's barely a survivor. The success of his plan, and of his own survival, had always relied on the muscle of his accomplices. It's something that's never sat right with him, even as he wrung the blood, sweat, and tears out of them. Right down to the very last drop.
Before he'd made a name for himself as one of America's Most Wanted, before Fox River, before anyone had died in his arms, or as a direct result of his actions, Michael's only real mark on the world had been through his architecture, from behind the safety of his desk. Living his life logistically. Schematically. Efficiently. Following the blueprint he had created for himself, according to the needs of society, and his place within it
And then he had lit those blueprints on fire, and thrown them out the window, into the water, where the FBI wouldn't find them, and life became something more than a concept.
It became something that could be taken from him.
He doesn't expect James to take his hand, but he wants him to. Life was in the little things, words, touches, scents. All the sensations, and moments, you didn't realize were privileges until they were gone. ]
Nice to meet you.
no subject
He takes the man's hand regardless. It costs him nothing of any currency he concerns himself with. Nothing of the soul surrendered.
His own hands are hard, calloused and scarred, the backs of them peppered with freckles where he's taken the sun, and the strength behind the shake is something that speaks to leashed violence just behind the restraint. It says: this is not a man tamed.]
Quite.
[His tone is dry. In all, pleasantries aside, it really does remain to be seen, doesn't it?]
They've refreshments.
[He nods towards the table. It's not exactly an offer, more a variable avenue of discussion.]
no subject
Michael feels everything. Every scar, every callus, every thickened joint, and battle-hardened bone. James' hands say more about him than anything he's said aloud.
They remind him of his brothers hands. Big, and strong, adept at hurting, and surprisingly capable of holding. Michael misses him. The corner of his mouth quirks. If Lincoln is gone, there's no point to any of it. If he allows himself to stop, and think about the possibility of having lost him, of losing, it might kill him.
He breathes in through his nose. Forces the thought back into the small, dark cell at the back of his mind where he keeps his fear, anxiety and regret under lock and key.
His grip is soft. Yielding. Allowing James to make as much, or as little, of the motion as he pleases. Michael's strength has never been one of force, or assertion. The warmth of his hand, and the suggestion of his fingertips, have their own hold. ]
What's your poison? Personally, I'm all about cake. Chocolate cake, specifically. The darker, the better.
no subject
Now, what the fuck is chocolate? His jaw ticks off to one side. The word cake is identifiable, certainly, though what he has in mind when he thinks of it is drastically different to the manner in which it's evolved over the centuries. Flint has no tolerance for sugar, and the fact that everything seems to be all but saturated in it has lead to his diet in Quarantine being rather sparse and mostly meat and vegetables. The size of a modern chicken is damn near startling by comparison. Bread, however, and all associated forms of it have proven too far outside his realm of taste for him to even attempt it now.]
Whiskey. Generally.
no subject
[ Michael has a complicated relationship with hard liquor. Drinking makes the noise go away. Dulls the sharp edges. Turns down the lights. After a couple shots of tequila, the world becomes a softer, kinder place, where he isn't under constant sensory assault.
After watching his brother lose himself at the bottom of a bottle, Michael isn't about to make the same mistake.
He picks his way across the room to the refreshment table, sliding between the dancing couples with a casual, effortless grace. A byproduct of constant, tireless awareness. Michael doesn't wait for James to survey the refreshments. There's a lot to look at, and it's been a while since he's had the luxury of picking his next meal, never mind taken the time to actually taste it.
He loads up on a couple tarts, some chocolate covered pretzels, and of course, the biggest slice of cake at the table. He's long past being ashamed. ]
No whiskey, but there's punch.
no subject
He has the grace, certainly, to slip through the crowds, to seamlessly enmesh elegance with courtesy and leave still waters in his wake, but he doesn't. People melt out of his way. His walk is not, strictly speaking, a prowl, but darkness nips at his heels anyway. For all that he has troubled himself to set Flint aside, certain things forged to truth by absolute necessity cannot be sloughed off like some ruin of burnt skin.
No whiskey, and the punch is too sweet. He takes water instead, though he does eye the considerable amount of what he can only describe as candy that is piled high on his plate. How uncouth.]
I believe I'll refrain.
no subject
Then when you get out, when you're finally past the bars, and on your two feet, nothing is the same.
He closes his eyes, licks the filling away from his lips, and finishes the rest in a second bite. Michael doesn't want to believe prison changed him. In his mind, he'd never truly been a prisoner. Just a man doing the right thing in the wrong place.
Michael slips the other tart into his pocket. Quickly, discreetly, like the thief he won't admit to being. ]
My brother always said to 'get while the getting's good', Who knows how long this will last.