❪ test drive: #1 - the overflow ❫

[natha]

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

[emblazes]

[He's just making amends to that intro...]

what's wrong with your name on here?
i didn't wake up with anyone else...

[Everyone else = paladins. What the heck.]

[competing]

[ how about he makes amends to your fACE ]

what do you mean
whats wrong with it

[ nah that's p much what he means tbh ]

[emblazes]

blueballin?

[If not for all of his credentials getting namedropped it would have been so difficult to discern this as Lance because Lance has never mentioned sports to him, for example???]

you asked where i am, it looks like a lounge.

[competing]

yeah cuz im a BALLER
get it B)

[ what the winky face wouldn't have given it away? ]

like a sleeping lounge or...

[emblazes]

not really...

[Enough of this slang, pls be respectful of his shacklife.]

you could sleep here if you wanted to, but that's not what i'm doing.

[GETTING WARMER.]

[competing]

you know
like im cool
but not just like COOL cool but street cool like the kind of cool with real street cred
also sports i think

[ omg just take notes or something!! ]

ok but you could probably sleep anywhere if you were tired enough

[ so that's not exactly helpful??? he saw how you lived ok. ]

are you near the mess hall? the training room?

[emblazes]

[Sounds like a lie...]

ok.

[Definitely sounds like a lie, even though Keith's experiencing the same sensation of a grandmother from 1902 being told about wifi. He's fairly certain Lance's just repeating Cool over and over again to amplify the meaning somehow.

While, also being deliberately confusing. Fuck you Lance he's seen enough History's Mysteries to unwravel your shit this time..............]

none of that means anything. hold on.

[While he wanders around just enough to gain a semblance of...bearings...ish. 'There's a hallway' probably isn't conductive to anything helpful either--]

moving toward the mess hall.

[competing]

[ you know nothing, keith snow!! ]

what do you mean it doesnt mean anything i just explained it all to you
okay so its like basketball players right?
basketBALL
basketBALLER
basketballs cool! sports are cool! especially like street basketball thats even cooler because you havent yet sold out you know

[ lance what the heck what are you even talking about

but in the midst of his (bad, terrible) attempts to explain just how incredibly and totally truly cool he is, he neglects to mention that he, too, is moving towards the mess hall

but in the exact opposite direction

and, okay, there's a reason there have been so many PSA's about not texting and walking because what happens when you have two teenagers too busy looking intently down at their phones to notice the other one is coming right up?

you guessed it. ]

—ow! Keith, what the heck!! Watch where you're going!

[ at least both their heads are hard...? ]

[emblazes]

[At least at one point, Keith did have his wits about him. He really should've disregarded the whole explanation with that, but no. In allowing himself to not only read along with all of that basketball nonsense, in attempting to make heads and tails of it all, he's completely blindsided in colliding with--

For all of a second, he's sure he's about to fight to the death with new (to him) species of alien, but Lance's big mouth serves well in quelling the urge to immediately square up.]

Lan--! You were the one who sent me a bunch of crap to read!

[He's extra-defensive in being vaguely happy about literally running into Lance. Like those guys who accidentally end up making out with their guy friends over a home-team touchdown during the Superbowl. He's happy and relieved deep down inside, if only he knew how to articulate this.]

I just told you where I was going!

[Just to further throw him under the bus. A belated hand comes up to knucklebrush at his forehead, the main point of contact in their meeting.]

[competing]

[ there's a steadily reddening spot forming just between his brows, square in the middle of his forehead. his hands are still too busy clutching his phone, thumbs poised and frozen in his mid-text. ]

Yeah, well, you should've been watching it. [ look, don't expect him to make sense after he just used up all his brain power trying to explain his way out of his amazing username okay.

anyway, he spares a quick moment to look keith over — all limbs seem to be intact, and he's definitely scowling like he usually does, so that must mean everything's okay. just like allura. just like he himself, when he'd woken up. it shouldn't be such a shock to him, given how well the castleship's own healing pods worked on him, but he can't quite help struggling to wrap his mind around how painless surviving a universe-eating storm had been... ]

Did you just wake up?

[emblazes]

You should have been too!

[The two of them together could create the most straightforward, authentically-bad anti-texting while walking ad. This truly is all of Lance's fault, right down to the whole purpose they'd been engrossed in texting eachother. Aside from actually trying to meet up with familiar faces on this weird -- planet?]

I woke up a little while ago.

[To be more precise, but basically: yes. His hand falls and settles at his side, proving how inconsequential their collision actually was. He good.]

The last thing I remember is -- Zarkon...

[Which, he should really be more concerned about. He would be a touch more frantic had Lance refrained from totally distracting him. What a good boy.]

[competing]

Right, yeah, Zarkon.

[ his words are brief, almost dismissive. half because he hadn't really wanted to be reminded of the less pleasant aspects of their past, and half because the reminder reminder him of another thought (just as brief, just as intentionally dismissed), that if these people really did go out of their way to save everybody, does that mean they saved people like zarkon, too?

he glances off towards to mess hall to their side. ]

The last thing I remember was making that final move againsf him, and hearing you shouting like a crazy person at the rodeo through our comms.

[ an obvious and outrageous over-exaggeration (or just outright lie tbh), but he's a good boy who continues to be a good distraction and since when has lance's recounts ever been for accuracy anyway?

he jerks a thumb towards the mess hall, continuing on without even really pausing for breath: ]

Did you eat yet? Hey, you think they got anything we'll recognize in here? Man, what I wouldn't do for a burger right now...

[ ARE YOU KEEPING UP, KEITH, get a move on because he's already five steps into the mess hall by now. ]

[emblazes]

[His jaw goes slack at that gross retelling of an exaggerated bullshit thing, visibly taking on the appearance of a woman who's been told her bust could stand to be more impressive. His eyes follow that thumb, though, a staggered look finds their original destination.]

Not yet. [He'll hold his tongue while Lance daydreams about burgers, rooted in place as Lance trudges onward. The mess hall was just a meeting point, not an activity.] How can you think about eating right now-?!

[At the end of the day, all that's happened might be objectively good, but Keith's several weeks away from any form of appreciation.]