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Pluviosa Mods ([personal profile] pluviosamods) wrote in [community profile] pluviooc2024-07-19 05:35 pm
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TEST DRIVE 03

TEST DRIVE

Hello, and welcome to the third Pluviosa Test Drive!

This Test Drive corresponds to Days 20-27 in the ship calendar, and will run until around the game's next major event. You can get a better idea what's going on in the most recent Game Update which covers Days 19-27, including the end of our previous event. Because some of the prompts in this test drive have differences based on whether they occur on Days 20-23 or 24 and on, you may wish to choose a firm date for your character's arrival and note it in your top level for other players.

Test Drive threads involving characters who are accepted are considered canon to the events of the game unless otherwise agreed by players/mods. Pluviosa does not do welcome mingle logs nor does it have any kind of in-character welcome information, making your test drive threads your character's arrival to the game setting. That said, mod-run interactions such as formal exploration and/or interactions with the Ship as an NPC are not available on the Test Drive.

It is advised that potential players familiarize themselves with the Premise page, the Rules/Session Zero page, and at least the first few paragraphs of the Setting page. As Pluviosa is a horror game, we especially encourage players to be aware of the content warnings that will be major themes of the game. If you have any further questions, you can ask them on the QUESTIONS header in the comments!

If you're test driving a character, you're welcome to join the game Discord and hang out and meet your fellow players!


ARRIVAL - GAZE FROM THE CLOUDS

Something jerks hard around your stomach, like a movement adruptly stopped. Something trickles through your hair, down the back of your neck - it's warm, and you get the feeling you know what it is.

But when you lift your neck to check, all there is is water. Somehow, counterintuitively, you feel a flash of disappointment. You feel someone's eyes on you...


As characters gain awareness of their surroundings, they will feel as though their head and neck are damp, as though they had just been in a light rain without any protection (even if they are, in fact, wearing a hat or hood). Unless they're particularly unlucky in the location where they wake up, though, the rain is in fact on the outside of the ship, and they are at most subject to humid air. Although the rainstorm in fact ends on Day 23, characters who arrive after that time will still be convinced that there is rain outside, complete with a hallucination of the sound of raindrops in the background, until they go to a window or an open-to-outside place (balconies, topside decks, etc) to check for themselves.

Rain aside, the feeling of being watched is stronger in the upper decks where characters arrive, which may send them seeking to go down instead of up. This might pose a problem in terms of actually making their way to the cleared, prepared-for-use parts of the ship... Especially with all that fresh rainwater breathing new life into the plants in the lower decks.

Note that prior to the rain ending, looking out the windows, glass balcony doors, or up into the domed roof of the passenger lounge will make it appear that the ship is underwater until late afternoon on Day 22. More information on this can be found on the So Below event posts. Additionally, the rainfall hitting the deck of the ship has a tendency to flood into the lower decks of the ship, particularly via the stairways and in rivulets down the hallways. It falls freely on the top deck and down into the open space in the center of the ship, though with less intensity than it does outside the ship's protective barrier.

SOMEBODY'S FOOTSTEPS

And while going down decreased the feeling of eyes on you, it brings about other complications. Ghosts have been present on the ship for around a week now, and their time being visible is nearing its end as the ship comes above the old sea-level line on Day 22... At least as far as the longer-term passengers are concerned.

New arrivals, however, will continue to be able to see ghosts haunting the decks for the first 24 hours of their stay onboard the ship, regardless of the exact date of their arrival. These ghosts largely take the form of vacationers and researchers (as described here under the Haunting Feeling and Growing Shadows sections, respectively), and do not respond to attempts to interact with them any more than they did during the event. Less, even - once the ship is above the sea level line (evening of Day 23 and on), the ghosts perform their loops without registering any attempts to communicate with them. No matter what a character does, their attempts to interact with the spirits are for nothing - even standing in their path just gets you walked through as though you weren't there.

However, there are also a few new ghosts who only appear to the new arrivals, and are invisible to characters who were on board the ship previously:

-> A young man in extremely worn clothing, nursing a bruised jaw wanders the upper parts of Fern deck. When he sees the newly arrived character, he says "Oh, not more of this shit," aloud before turning and booking it off in another direction. Characters who chase him will find that he is visible and audible for a decent amount of time, but that his knowledge of the twists and turns of the Ship exceeds theirs and that he is unhindered by any of the overgrown vines as though they weren't there. As such, characters will inevitably fall behind and lose track of him.
-> At night, a dark-skinned woman can be seen in the lounge, looking back and forth between a glowing tablet she's holding and the sky above. If she notices a newly arrived character in the dimmed-to-nearly-nothing, she tells them in a firm voice, "You're not night shift. Go back to bed, you need your rest," before going back to whatever she's doing with her tablet screen. She fades slowly out of sight afterwards.
-> An androgynous person with a nearly-shaved head and a small flower dangling from a green marking over their ear comes out of the communal showers near the cafeteria. They glance around and ask, "Hey, did you see where that new guy with the eyepatch went?" but head off down the hallway without waiting for an answer, scrubbing at their cropped hair with a towel wrapped around their head.
-> A young woman in an open bathrobe with bandages around her middle looks out the back of the ship from the cafeteria deck, sitting with her feet dangling over the edge over where the ship's protective bubble attaches. Her light brown hair is blowing into her face constantly by the cafeteria's slight wind tunnel effect, but she doesn't seem to care, supporting herself by leaning her arms onto the lower rung of the railing. If approached, she gives a tired smile and says, "It's alright. I'm just waiting for that nice angel to come back," and resumes her watch out the back, not responding to any further questions or interactions.

These ghosts do not seem to register the presence of those who have been on board the ship more than 24 hours, even if pointed out directly. New arrivals who attempt to interact with the ghosts will be able to see and hear them, but not touch them. Attempting to touch a ghost in a way that 'proves' that they're not physically there (eg walking through them) causes the ghost to disappear, and they will not reappear.

JUST ANOTHER WORKDAY

Of course, the upper floors of the ship are not exactly free of eyes. A rather sizeable fleet of motorized drones zips around the hallways, ranging in size from knee-height to large enough to contain a moderately sized couch. The former are often equipped with scrubbing devices along their undersides, and work hard at portions of the floor in the hallways; the largest are functionally dumpsters on wheels, and other drones with long unfolding arms prune and rip plants from the walls, floors, and even the ceilings to fill them. These top two levels of Fern - not the open deck but the two floors immediately below - are clearly undergoing renovations, and renovations start with getting the plants out of the way. A few are even doing electrical or plumbing work, once things have dried up enough after the rain that it's safe to do so.

Since these are also the primary floors on which new arrivals wake up, it's very difficult to not come across some form of cleaning bot soon after arrival. However, there seems to be something a little... off about the ship's cleaning crew if you're a new arrival. They don't seem to register new arrivals as passengers yet; as a result, new characters may find themselves sprayed down with hot soapy water or subject to a set of surprisingly strong mechanical arms trying to shove them into a dumpster. Even if you aren't actively being aggressed by cleaning bots, they don't provide the kinds of loud "warning: backing up" noises they do for other passengers, nor do they slow down to avoid running you down in the still-mostly-dark hallways. The drones either have very good night vision or have some other way of finding their way around, since the only thing that brings them to a halt is particularly bad patches of floor.

Ship drones will continue to treat new arrivals as part of the walls (at best) or particularly stubborn plants in need of pruning (at worst) until either a light is shined on them - but beware, because this will cause any plants in the area to experience a surge of growth - or another, more known passenger intervenes. Admittedly, at that point the drones will be positively apologetic, as much as robots not equipped with voices can be. Soaked characters will be given a complimentary warm-air drying (if they stick around long enough) and anyone thrown in the dumpsters will be appropriately rescued - but it's still not all that great of a first impression, is it?

IDEAL CAMOUFLAGE

Or perhaps it's not the ghost of a person or the drones of the ship that you first encounter. It could be something significantly less civilized.

Strange animals have begun to appear in the ship's jungle - but you'd be forgiven for not noticing them at first. At rest, anyone would dismiss them as strangely shaped bundles of plant matter, because that's exactly what they are. Tails formed out of plaited vines; pelts and feathers formed of interlocked leaves; legs grown out of twisted wood with roots formed into toes. And, occasionally, sharp claws made of bent nails, fangs made of shattered glass, and antlers of rusted pipe, and, always, eyes like black pits that could swallow you up if you stared into them too long.

The 'animals' occupying Fern deck, if they can be called such, are formed out of plant matter with scattered bits of debris from the ship itself. They are, by and large, animals appropriate to the environment of the temperate rainforest that consumes the deck - no elephants or giraffes here. Deer, foxes, the occasional big cat or even a bear, and any number of smaller creatures... Smaller being a relative term, because the animals aren't always to their proper scale relative to humans. A deer might be only knee-high (antlers included), while a squirrel may come up to your waist. On most decks, they're limited to the height of the ceilings above them (9 feet or so), but if you manage to encounter them either on the open upper deck (with its much less height-limited tree canopy) or at the bottom (where the gap in the ship's decks, down the center, leaves lots of space for clearance above the mud and standing water), they could easily be taller.

Most of them are quite skittish, and will bound off into the jungle from which they came and disappear as though they were never there. A handful, though, respond as though threatened - or hungry. And while it might be funny to be stalked through the underbush by a cougar the size of a house cat, it will be less funny if it manages to sink its very real rusty claws into you, and getting trampled by a wooden deer whose antlers scrape the rotten ceiling tiles won't be fun at all.

It is possible to fight the animals, though most will make an attempt to flee if they get the chance, especially if you bring light or fire to bear against them. A 'killed' animal collapses into a pile of plant matter (leaves, branches, vines, etc) with the occasional bit of metal or glass; these heaps don't maintain their form as the 'body' of an animal and don't seem to have been connected together in any way. If lit on fire or otherwise affected by supernatural abilities, the animals react to this as an animal would be expected to, but their bodies are affected in ways consistent with the plant matter they're made of. In addition, no attempts at animal communication will work on them. On the other side of the coin, if you attempt to flee from them, most won't bother to give chase.
dreaminglynx: (Lalli_ouch)

Silly time! Delightful!

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-07-26 10:49 pm (UTC)(link)
Lalli feels a weight throw him off balance just enough to toss him back onto the cushions with an "oof!" He finds his face making contact with the couch cushions as he hears something on his back.

He scrambles back into an upright position and turn to see a- cat? A gray cat with back stripes. It reminds him of Kissu back at home. The strange pouch is odd... but he blinks when it... talks? Is this like the weird dog that follows Reynir around? Is he dreaming after all? (Not that he remembers falling asleep.)

He grumbles, "Nothing is right." He confirms. This entire situation is making his head spin.

He sighs, "I don't know either. If this is a dream or not." He states it as plain fact, because animals don't talk, spirits, people, and trapped ones do though. "Maybe I didn't realize I feel asleep," he points out. "It explains you at least."
Edited (Some edits) 2024-07-28 06:58 (UTC)
yourguidingcat: Render of Chirithy. Plush gray cat with black stripes, wearing a little cape. Their sewn-on eyes are in a neutral expression. (bongo cat)

[personal profile] yourguidingcat 2024-07-31 06:48 am (UTC)(link)

Chirithy shakes its head. "Mm-mn," it says, tune negative. "This isn't a dream. I would know if it was. But this world is wide awake. And so are you."

"Not... that I have any idea where we are," Chirithy sighs. "Or what we're doing here. But It's not a dream - not the way I know dreams, anyway."

Edited 2024-07-31 06:49 (UTC)
dreaminglynx: (Lalli_grumpy)

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-07-31 08:08 am (UTC)(link)
"Not if I have a weird cat talking to me," Lalli retorts. "It only happens with that weird dog that hangs around the tall stupid one I know." He crosses his arms on the couch.

"Mrrrr..." he makes a little strange noise like that of a growl and scrunches his face. He doesn't like not knowing that, he should know too... How... did they get here? "I know dreams, sometimes they are like this." Walking in a dream is not too much different than in the waking world. Or perhaps he's in denial... Not that he wants to admit that. He looks back at the strange cat, "Otherwise I think I've completely lost my mind. Or you're a weird ghost..."
Edited 2024-07-31 08:09 (UTC)
yourguidingcat: Chirithy, facing right. (facing right)

[personal profile] yourguidingcat 2024-08-01 08:21 pm (UTC)(link)

"I'm not weird! I'm magic!" Chirithy protests, tilting their head up in defiance. "I'm a Dream Eater, and you might not know what that is, but in my World, we're pretty common place, thank you!"

"Hmm... well we aren't going to get anywhere arguing about whether this is a dream or not," Chirithy says, reasonably, and then it backpedals and jumps with surprise. "Wait, you know dreams? What do you mean by that!? Even Keyblade wielders have to be pretty advanced to be able to enter dreams...!"

dreaminglynx: (Lalli_use your head)

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-08-01 09:01 pm (UTC)(link)
"Well I am a mage, so I know what happens when I'm dreaming," Lalli mutters back. He does seem to stop for a moment at the thought of that. He's seen a decent amount of spirits and ghosts and creatures in dreams, but a dream eater? He doesn't like the sound of that. "A dream- what?.. My dreams aren't for eating."

Lalli folds his arms and grumbles something under his breath, looking away and curling up a little on the couch. He's not amused by the concept that he wouldn't know what he was talking about. He's only made that mistake- No, he doesn't make mistakes like that. He looks back in surprise when the cat thing talks about dreams. "Of course I do! It's what mages do, and I've been able to do it for years! Even the stupid, really tall one I know can do it!" He tilts his head at the term 'keyblade wielder' and states, "Keys are too small to be blades..."
Edited (smallll edit) 2024-08-01 21:02 (UTC)
yourguidingcat: Render of Chirithy. Plush gray cat with black stripes, wearing a little cape. Their sewn-on eyes are in a neutral expression. (balloons)

[personal profile] yourguidingcat 2024-08-05 06:53 pm (UTC)(link)

"Well, sure - I only eat bad dreams!" Chirithy insists, to Lalli's offense. "I wouldn't eat just any old dream."

"Mage...? What does that have to do with dreaming?" Chirithy is genuinely confused, their head tilting to the side. Is this a whole study of magic he has no idea about? Dream mages??

Man, explaining things is hard! At least in Daybreak Town, everyone knew what a Keyblade was, even if they didn't totally understand the Dream Eater thing. "No, no, a Keyblade is like - it's like if a sword was shaped like a Key!"

dreaminglynx: (Lalli_confused)

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-08-06 11:43 pm (UTC)(link)
Lalli nods, “Good. Some people need that.” He wouldn’t truly constitute a bad dream in the same category as what he usually faces. A dangerous dream maybe, but he’ll take it.

Lalli tilts his head and leans back in confusion, “A lot. All mages can dream the way I do. We... walk in dreams; every night. Very normal.”

“Sounds weird and ugly,” he raises an eyebrow at the idea of it. “And very dull... is it dull?” He can’t quite imagine the idea of wielding a large dull key around. Flying fish in dreams are one thing, but this feels very strange for something that isn’t a dream.
yourguidingcat: Zoomed in photo of Chirithy's face. They look distressed. (flipped)

[personal profile] yourguidingcat 2024-08-13 09:18 am (UTC)(link)

"...huh." So it is a study of magic that Chirithy has never heard of. "I've never heard of mages! Or dream walking! But that sounds similar to my own abilities - Spirits like me can walk in dreams, too, sort of." Of course it's mostly only polite to do it with his own wielder, but.

But this slander against Keyblades! He won't stand for!!! "Obviously it's not--" ...is it dull? Chirithy has never considered this before. "Nevermind. It's magic!! So it doesn't matter if it's dull or not! It's plenty fine against Heartless."

And other Keyblade wielders, but Chirithy doesn't want to think about that!

dreaminglynx: (Lalli_confused)

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-08-13 10:36 pm (UTC)(link)
"I walk in them all the time," he says. "It's very common, I do it basically every night." Lalli nods a little bit at his own information. He takes a moment of nodding to look at the being, "Wait... are you a spirit?" He looks surprised, Chirithy looks solid!

Lalli huffs, "Sharp is better, even if you are using magic. Then it needs a much lesser spell." It's not a good idea to drain out energy when you don't have to, you'll get drained!

He pauses and looks confused, "Heartless? You mean ghosts?" He doesn't seem to get this term at all either...
yourguidingcat: Chirithy tilts his head down sadly. (sad)

[personal profile] yourguidingcat 2024-08-14 08:52 am (UTC)(link)

If Chirithy's arms were long enough to facepalm, they would. Seeing as they aren't, instead Chirithy just sighs and sits down. "No, no, sorry. Spirits are what we call the Dream Eaters that only eat bad dreams. I'm just a normal magic talking plush cat."

Yep! So normal!

"Oh - the Keyblade isn't magic like that," Chirithy says, then its stitched-eyes narrow. "Boy, I wish I had better words to talk about this. Keyblade wielders are people with really strong hearts," he tries to explain. "And the Keyblade itself is just an extension of your heart. It's magic, but it's not like the magic you have to learn, or spend energy to cast. A Keyblade is with you forever. You can't lose it."

You can give it up or give it away, certainly. But that's besides the point Chirithy is trying to make, right now!!

"....sort of like ghosts," Chirithy relents, because whether or not Lalli understands Heartless is less important to them than that Lalli understands how important Keyblades are. "They're just a kind of monster that exists where I come from."

dreaminglynx: (Lalli_confused)

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-08-17 08:26 pm (UTC)(link)
Lalli blinks at the strange situation, he does take a a somewhat cautious approach as he sits beside the strange being. "Plush cats can't talk," he explains simply. That.... didn't help much. He shakes his head, "Never heard of dream eaters. Spirits, yes." At least they both know that they know what spirits are? Progress??

"I wish there were better words," Lalli mutters. Languages and talking to people is very hard. He tilts his head and watches with interest at the strange creature's actions. "Like a mage, strong willed, able to summon a luonto for strength," he states. He nods, he may be connecting the dots badly, but he's at least connecting it to something.

He nods solemnly, "I understand." He understands spirits and ghosts, especially ones that are malevolent. At least that is making progress.

He pauses, "What does that make you? Spirit or ghost?"
yourguidingcat: Chirithy looks to the side. The higher-rendered art makes its eyes look pissed off. (side)

[personal profile] yourguidingcat 2024-08-19 01:39 am (UTC)(link)

Chirithy paps their hands against their face a few times. This is getting nowhere, and he's not even sure he understands what Lalli means by a Spirit. Should he tell him that?? ...at least Lalli seems to understand the Keyblade thing. That's a relief.

"Well, I'm glad we're able to communicate - it's good to understand each other!" Chirithy insists, falling back on formalities while flustered. It pauses for a significant amount of time when Lalli asks.

"A... Spirit?" Chirithy decides, because they're definitely not a ghost! "Just so we're both, er, completely sure we're on the same page. What are Spirits like, in your world?"

dreaminglynx: (Lalli_confused)

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-08-24 10:58 pm (UTC)(link)
Lalli tilt his head at the actions of the weird creature, but at least waits to let the strange being finish.

"It is," he notes, seemingly understanding even if he wasn't understanding the abolsute annoyance of both of them not truly being on the same page. It's just... sadly going to take time to figure it out.

"Well... In a dream, they are more solid... Corporeal... but in the waking world that are more like voices or ghosts," he states. It seems Lalli is still trying to understand the nature of a walking, talking cat plush.

((Sorry I rolled a nat 1 on this one))
yourguidingcat: sometimes you feel an emotion so strongly you become a marketable plushie (plushie)

[personal profile] yourguidingcat 2024-09-20 07:34 am (UTC)(link)

"I see... You know, maybe I'm not a Spirit like yours are, after all," Chirithy answers. "I'm just... a little creature?? I'm a little guy?? Ohhh, I don't know! My Master made me so that I could guide my friend Mint - I'm just magic given form! And without Mint, I'm probably nothing!! Does any of that help?!"

They are getting really, really flustered by this.

dreaminglynx: (Lalli_smile)

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-09-20 10:55 pm (UTC)(link)
"Ah... I see," Lalli states. "Made of magic but a spirit, something like a luonto given living form." He nods. It seems that... actually worked.

"I understand," he nods with a little smile, satisfied with the answer.
yourguidingcat: Chirithy clings to your shoulder. (shoulder)

ok tosses at you as Ending.

[personal profile] yourguidingcat 2024-09-21 09:45 am (UTC)(link)

That.... worked???? Okay. Okay. That worked! Sure!!

"Yes, just like that! So glad we got that all worked out!"

What a relief.

dreaminglynx: (Lalli_smile)

They finally got to an understanding

[personal profile] dreaminglynx 2024-09-21 09:46 pm (UTC)(link)
Lalli nods, "I am too. Too many confusing things in this place. At least one is solved now."