❪ test drive: #1 ❫

[natha]

OVERFLOW POST

YOUR STORY BEGINS     The Storm came. You only remember darkness, but you don't remember much after that. All you know, perhaps, is that it was cold as you slept. You don't know for how long you slept, but the dreams were short, at least. You remember the expanse of stars and the universe that came in view. Every world and solar system ever known was displayed in your dreams in careful, pristine detail. You have also witnessed The Storm, which has devoured a fair portion of these galaxies. It was a dark, thick smog; ominous in appearance and ever foreboding. Your Earth and similar planets were immersed in The Storm. Somehow, you knew it would be the last you'd see of it. That was when she told you what happened, and how you can help. You knew that you'll be living somewhere new, even though you never asked for it. The details here weren't clear, but you knew you'd made a deal with Darma. Not long after, you'll wake at Thesa Station — Your body is still cold. It was all a dream, but somehow, you knew it wasn't — now, will you keep that promise you made to Darma? PROMPT: THE MESS HALL     It's fascinating to the Orbiters how such a dull room can be turned around so completely with people in it. All meals are served by Roman, and while all the food is delicious, some of it is a bit odd. Is that neon green soup? That’s hideous. If you happen to be in the mess hall at a particularly unlucky time, you and the food will suddenly begin to drift. Someone’s got jokes, and they’ve turned off the gravity control. Now it’s just you, your fellow refugees, and the floating sea of food. Wait, did that person just chuck a pie in your direction? PROMPT: TRAINING MODULES     While it’s all nice and well to familiarize oneself with Thesa Station, it is most advised that new arrivals venture out a bit. Not physically. No one is quite prepared for that yet. However, there will be several virtual reality training programs set for those who dare to be adventurous. For those who aren’t and don’t dare, well— good luck, all the same. Be advised, however, that participating in one of the training modules will start you off favorably with the Natha Orbiters’ in terms of REPUTATION. Once seated and appropriately strapped in, the system will automatically whir to life and the dense foliage and forestry of a section of El Nysa will open up. According to one’s map registry, it clear to see that it’s miles from the outer gates of Olympia, but not as far enough to venture into any other territories. So, in that sense, you’re safe. 1. Or you could have been, but unfortunately the wilderness is home to various types of beasts and monsters hailing from different universes and galaxies. On the bright side, perhaps one of them will be oddly familiar to you. Or maybe someone else who is currently synced is willing to give you that extra helping hand. Fortunately, if you’re powerless, there are options. From telekinesis to flight, there are strange abilities one can adopt and “test” out in the virtual reality. Granted, you’re only limited to one at a time. They say in the near future, some of you may be granted these abilities under certain conditions. But, please practice some caution. You aren’t alone in the system, after all. 2.. Who do you fight for, the VR system will ask you individually before you enter the module. The righteous Olympians, or the free-spirited Wyvers? Whatever your choice, when you enter El Nysa, you will wholly and truly believe your allegiance. A. Working together: You now have to suffer the consequences of your choice, as you and your partner have been captured by guards of the opposite faction. Now jailed and soon-to-be tortured, you must find some way to negotiate your release. Perhaps you’ll find some means to escape without detection. Maybe you’re the “fight your way out” sort of people. B. Facing your enemy: That person you stepped into the VR with? They’re out to capture you. Or maybe you seek to capture them. 3. When you enter the virtual reality, things aren’t exactly how they’re supposed to be. Maybe that’s natural, especially if this is your first time, but the problems here seem a bit more fundamental. Maybe you find yourself under a parental safety lock, and you’re suddenly censored. Exposed back? Censored. Body suit? Censored. Or replaced with a mascot costume. Worst of all? You can’t sign out. Not right now, at least. Regardless, whatever it is— ridiculous filters, body alterations, or even body swaps with other users... you are assured it’ll all be fixed with due time. Zasere sends his humblest apologies and promises no more wire chewing, or so the announcement states. PROMPT: STASIS UNIT     You have found the massive section of Thesa known as the Stasis Unit. There’s no special access required to access this part of Thesa Station, but refugees are warned that it may not be for the faint of heart. Here, in large pods that nearly cover every square inch of the space, are all of the people the Orbiters have managed to rescue. Your loved ones, your greatest enemy, your next door neighbor— you might find them here. These people are in a state of deep cryosleep. Due to the damaging effects of The Storm, their bodies are not yet ready to be awoken. PROMPT: HANGAR STATION     You find your way to the hangar station. Here rests are a factory worth of docked mobile suits. You recall how the Orbiters had previously spoken of a "space frontier," but only after seeing this you realize how real their words are. Most machinery have marks of wear and tear, assurance that they have indeed been used before, and an assembly of others are going through repairs and maintenance. No one seems to care that you've just strolled in. In fact, there seems to be a couple of the aircraft that beckon you to take a closer look. Maybe you’ll only look on the outside, maybe you'll be greeted by the hand of a mobile suit extending toward you and welcoming you to its cockpit. You go out and explore SPACE!!! Unfortunately, that mobile suit should have warned you it only had 20 minutes of flight time left in its system. Or, perhaps, you’re a particularly ambitious pilot and you’ve strayed past the designated perimeter. Either way, the HUD display is now blinking with errors, cropping up with a single message: DISTRESS SIGNAL. 1. You’re the poor sap who happened to chill around the Observation Deck. Unfortunately, everyone seems busy with the influx of mobile suits out and about, and the only one who can answer this distress signal is on the Navigation System, well, you. Hope you can figure out the controls fast enough. Guide the pilot back to the safety of the hangar using the most efficient route possible. Keen Navigators will find an instruction manual that provides a shortcut to automatically return a suit back to base. 2. You’re actually sitting in a two-seater mobile suit. Funny how that works, isn’t it? Maybe you were unwittingly dropped down a hatch, or dragged along for a joyride by your ambitious co-pilot. Either way, it looks like help is going to take some time... PROMPT: OMAGE     Upon receiving your mobile phone, you will be asked to set a username. Voila, you can now access the network! You can choose to send a message to the entire network, specific usernames, or you can try out the Orbiters’ service, Omage, which connects you to a random user. They thought this might be a good way for their new guests to make friends with each other... Connecting to server... Looking for someone you can chat with... You’re now chatting with [username]... Say hi! PROMPT: WILDCARD     You are welcome to write any scenarios in Thesa Station! Characters have been granted temporary access to the Observation Room, and are encouraged to study it carefully. FINAL OOC NOTE     These threads may be carried over as game canon if players choose! Players are encouraged to submit TDM threads as application samples, but they are not required. Please direct any OOC questions to the questions thread below! A Training Module thread of AC length on the TDM may be submitted for 1 NATHA ORBITER REPUTATION POINT after acceptance. QUICK NAV premise ● faq ● world ● map ● reputation ● npcs taken ● reserves ● application calendar ● hiatus/drops ● modbox [ FULL NAVIGATION ] elnysa nysalogs nysaisles nysaooc elnyan

Comments

cheryl blossom | riverdale

[sweetwater]

training module

[ Cheryl has no powers. not at the moment, but there's been alluded promises to what could be, and Cheryl likes to be powerful. so she's practicing. telekinesis is harder than she imagined, but she's slowly getting the hang of it. she's going to get it before she wanders farther to see what monsters wait around the corner.

a noise distracts her, and the rock she's been concentrating on tumbles to the ground. she whips around to see the source of the sound. ]

Has anyone ever told you that silence is a virtue?

statsis unit

[ she doesn't have to look for her brother Jason's pod, because she found it as soon as she heard it might be here. Cheryl visits a lot: she talks to him, falls silent like she's listening to a response. in all honestly it's a little weird but anyone who has met her knows that Cheryl seems to be a little frayed around the edges when it comes to her sanity.

waiting for Jason is hard, so she's decided to look for a way to not have to wait anymore. which is why Cheryl can be found lurking around control panels and wires. she's just looking. and touching. she hasn't found the guts to press any buttons just yet. ]

How long do you think we were asleep? What do you remember?

[ just making conversation. or collection information? it's hard to say. ]


omage

Connecting to server...
Looking for someone you can chat with...
You’re now chatting with rivervixen... Say hi!

This sort of thing is less entertaining without the video chat, don't you think?

[webdesigned]

( he's really, honestly, still pretty unused to girls that look like Cheryl talking to him.

not just because she's pretty. and she is pretty. that's not the point. no, it's the — it's the head high and eyes mean and a smile that doesn't seem particularly kind of you really look at it thing. and no offense because he's only seen her talking to another ginger in a pod so he has no firm basis for this assessment but the loner nerd in him spotted the predator in her a mile away. hilariously, because she's at least a full head shorter.

she's a mean girl. call it spider senses, call it whatever you want, he is automatically on edge because girls like her do not speak to him. and it's ... it's probably for the best, because how awkward he is would only give them ammunition. case in point. )

What? ( real smart. super great start to this conversation. peter winces from his spot cross legged on the floor — he comes here a lot too, just staring at the face of his aunt like knowing how much he misses her might be enough to wake her up. so far... no. ) I— uh. Er. I dunno. I mean, I don't know. I was... you know... ( unconscious. at the time. Peter falls painfully silent after that impressive display of conversation, though as Cheryl gets too close to the wires, he interrupts his self imposed silence with, ) Be careful, you don't want to overload the system. That could be bad for everyone in here.

[sweetwater]

[ this conversation is going really well. the longer he stumbles the less impressed she looks, and she wasn't impressed at all to begin with. she's not expecting him to just give up on the conversation but that is basically what happens. Cheryl could say something mean, but instead she laughs and goes back to poking about where she's not supposed to be, which is probably meaner.

but she whips back around when he tells her to stop. Cheryl looks him up and down. ] Look who found his words. Bravo.

[ he does make a fair point. she doesn't want to kill anyone. okay - so she mostly doesn't want to kill Jason. but killing anybody would not have any sort of positive impact on her social status. ] You look like you're a computer nerd. What do you know about all of this? Don't be shy. Sharing is caring.

[webdesigned]

( well, he wasn't exactly anticipating talking to her again, either. if only he could get his Aunt May moved to another depressing pod, just for the sake of his pride. too bad that isn't going to happen, not unless she happens to wake up. maybe she will be so ashamed of his inability to talk to a girl that she'll bust out and drag him off by the ear.

if only...

Peter does what he can to look unimpressed by her chiding, though really, does he have a right to rebuke her when he could hardly string a sentence together? ) I don't. Okay? From what I saw the system was not much like what I've ever seen before. Maybe I could figure it out, with time, but is it worth the risk?

( he doesn't know how the people in the pods were affected, if breaking them out again will help them or just make things worse. frankly, he doesn't know much of anything right now. it's kind of scary, though he doesn't want to admit it to a stranger. )

[sweetwater]

overflow

omage

[apomekhane]

You're now chatting with Ava... Say hi!

What would you show me if this was video?

[sweetwater]

Nothing raunchy. I like to see people's faces. It keeps things interesting. And it's not as easy to lie.

[apomekhane]

:) It is easy to tell when someone is lying if you can see their face.

What does your face look like?

[sweetwater]

Pale skin, brown eyes, and full lips. Red is my signature color and that includes red lipstick. The whole Blossom family has red hair. What do you look like?

1/2

[apomekhane]

Do you like how you look?

2/2

[apomekhane]

Here I am.

::::::::::::~.:$7I7?+====+.,...,==+++=~~
::::::::::::~~=~=+++?+?I+~=~.,..,~==+=~~
::::::::::::~~==++?+??+=I?~+~=,...~~=+=~
::::::::::~~~==+??IIII??++=+==~....:~==~
,::::,::~~~~==+??III777?=+~~,,=~...,:~~~
::,,,:~~~~===+??II77$$$7+7+:~=+~,..,.,~:
:::::~~~~~~~=+??I77$$$$$$II~~=~=,..,..,,
~:::,~~~~~~+$$Z77$$$$$$$Z7?I,,Z:,..,...,
~~~~:=?=~=?I$$II7$Z$$ZZZZZ$78$?,,,,,,,,:
~~~~+ZIN:=ZZZ:7DNZ$$$$ZZZZZO8$Z,,,,:,,,:
~~~~~=?7~?7$?77Z$7I7$$ZZZZOZ8ZO,,,,::,,:
~~~~~~=~=III+=+++?7$$ZZZZZZ8OZ~,:::::,:~
~=~~~~::+?ZI+=+?I7$ZZZZZZZO7$8,::::::::~
=====~~?Z$$O++?I7$$ZZZZZOO$Z.::::::~:::~
=====~~~+II?+?I7$$ZZZZZZZ8?:,::::::~~::~
=====~~+?IIIII$$$$ZZZZZZOZ.,:::::::~~:~~
=====~?=I7ZOO7Z$$$ZZZZZZ+8.::::::::~~:~=
======~=I7I77$$ZZZZZZZZN$O,::::::::~~:~=
=====~~~==+?7$ZZZZZZZ88ZOZ,::::::::~~:~=
=====~~~++I7$ZZZ$ZO8ZDOMOO=::::::::~~:~=
=====~~~~:,:.?$ZOOZO:ZI8$$O::::::::~~:~~
=====~~~~~:~:~I77$D,I8DZO?Z:,,:::~~~~:~~
====~~~~~~:~:,?IIOI?O Z$OOOZZ8O,:::~:::~
=~~~~~~~~~:~::???=778O$$$DDD88DD:::~::::
~~~~~~::~~:~:,,:$~7$N8DDDD7?7I77Z:::::::

[sweetwater]

I do.

[ Cheryl thinks her phone must be broken, but figures it out quickly when she looks at bigger picture instead of a single line. ]

How did you do that?

[apomekhane]

With letters. If I saw your face, I could make yours too!

Do you want to play a game?

stasis

[refashioned]

[At this point, it's almost impossible to live in Riverdale without knowing exactly what Jason Blossom looks like. Veronica only knows of him by reputation—and she doesn't know enough to be able to determine any truth—but that's a reputation that largely involves him being dead. She hadn't expected to find Cheryl peering up at him within his stasis pod, or within a pod period. Just the same, she recovers, perking up as best as she can to peer over at Cheryl.

Then again, there's a lot about this that leaves her uncertain, beginning with the whole part of what she remembers. She remembers some very odd things. It puts her in a position of discomfort, but she's not ready to reveal that. Especially to Cheryl. It's not like she's been the one on the receiving end of Cheryl's schemes most of the time. If anything, she mostly understands where Cheryl's coming from—she gets it. But Veronica knows better than to appear vulnerable in a time when anyone can be vulnerable.]

We had to be asleep for a while, right? [It's a non-answer if there was ever one. Veronica very pointedly doesn't look back toward Jason, but it should be said that she's noticed the lack of bullet hole in his forehead.] Because we're definitely not in Kansas anymore. ... Though yes, I know—it's a cliché of a statement if there was ever one, but I really think it suits this situation.

[sweetwater]

[ she nods. Veronica is right, cliché or not. Veronica may not be her favorite person, but she can admit to herself that it's nice to have someone around who understands. and she thinks she'll keep Veronica's secrets if Veronica keeps hers.

everything that happened to bring them here is the cherry on top of a few very bad months in Riverdale. the upside is that Jason is alive, if one can count being suspended in a strange pod as living. and honestly? she's pretty happy to not be in Riverdale, even if their current surroundings leave something to be desired. ]

It'll be better when Jason wakes up. [ having him back, she thinks, will fix everything. ]

Have you seen any of the others? In the pods.

[refashioned]

[Seeing Jason Blossom is like experiencing a sharp case of uncanny valley. She finds herself almost forced to look up again, eyes passing over his features. He really does look a lot like Archie—but there's something sharper about his features, cold, distant, that she's never been able to really read. It's hard to know someone who doesn't exist beyond stories.

It's hard to think of him as living and breathing. "... when Jason wakes up" is one of the odder thoughts she's ever had to recognize. From the moment she landed in Riverdale, there was never a question of that happening. It was all a matter of when what remained would turn up—and turn up it did, soon enough.

She frowns, arms loosely hanging at her sides for lack of anything else to do.]

My parents. It wasn't hard to find them. [Almost as if she had been led to them. She knows that's not the case. Veronica conceals the reticence in her voice, the uncertainty over her relationship with her parents. That's another vulnerability, complicated by all of this. They live. That's enough. (It feels like that should be the truth, anyway.)]

I haven't had much of a look around, and something tells me that the Blossoms and Lodges aren't the only chosen survivors of Riverdale. So, why don't we see who we can find? [It feels like neutral territory, at least. They both have something to gain from knowing who might greet them someday.]

[sweetwater]

[ her parents. Cheryl swallows down a barb about Hiram Lodge. being cruel is reflex, but none of that drama matters now. the topic of parents is a glass house where Cheryl shouldn't be throwing stones, anyway. ]

An adventure to recover the lost sons and daughters of Riverdale? I'm in.

[ she gestures down the row. ] I've already been that way. No one noteworthy.

[refashioned]

You'd think they'd take care to put our hearts and mind at ease by providing a little organization in here. [It occurs to her that Cheryl might not see people as "noteworthy" the way that Veronica would, but the circumstances are a little ... different here. Unique. And horribly depressing.

That last one is a big one.

Cheryl's willing to commit when the time calls for it, and past experience tells Veronica that this is one of those times.]

Maybe if Betty turns up, we can see what she can do in getting these things organized. [There's a hint of obvious fondness to her voice as she begins the casual strides toward searching for their lost neighbors. If anyone can micromanage things to be searchable and manageable, it's Betty Cooper. Barring uninvited guests and annoying ex-football players, of course.

She almost suggests that she and Cheryl pick up the slack in Betty's absence, but she recognizes that maybe it's better that they don't commit to such a huge thing ... together. Besides, she figures that if Cheryl's going to be here, it's going to be for the sake of visiting Jason. That's a private thing.]

[sweetwater]

Exactly! They know too much about all of us to not know who belongs with us. We're asking for a few directions and labels, not time travel.

[ oh, Betty. thing would be a lot different if she was around. they'd be beyond organized. she'd be rallying people and making sure everyone she'd met knew where all their loved ones were too. that's a level of kindness that Cheryl's not sure she can tap into. ]

Betty will wake up already having a plan. [ if that's what happens, she won't be surprised. ]

I wonder why we're first. If they chose us. [ and wouldn't that be an odd choice? Veronica and Cheryl, out of everyone. ] I'm obviously my first choice, but we wouldn't have been. [ she means well. kind of? ]

omage

[trybelieving]

You’re now chatting with tinker bell... Say hi!

we don't use video chat where I'm from.
it might be more entertaining, but I find this fun, too.
rivervixen? that's quite a name.

[sweetwater]

I won't deny that this is a good way to pass the time.

My name is Cheryl. The Riven Vixens were my cheerleading squad at home. I was the Captain.

Your name is Tinker Bell?

[trybelieving]

and suddenly there's a lot of time to pass.
it's nice to meet you, Cheryl. even over text.
my name is Tinker Bell. I get that a lot.

[sweetwater]

Your parents named you Tinker? [ and she thought her own parents were weird! ]

[trybelieving]

I don't have parents.
it's not a first/last name sort of thing. just Tinker Bell.

[sweetwater]

[ Cheryl is pretty sure everyone has parents. but she also didn't think that a giant space storm would devour everything she's ever known and loved, so she is also willing to concede that she isn't always right. ]

Tinker Bell. It has a nice ring to it.

What do you like about our new home?