TEST DRIVE 005

[phantasmods]

Hello and welcome to the fifth test drive for Phantasmal Rift!

Test drive threads are assumed to be game canon for accepted characters unless otherwise noted, so don't feel like you'll have to introduce yourself a second time to everyone you meet! As an added bonus, participation in the test drive comes with the chance to earn up to two items of loot for your trouble! Characters who are accepted can earn one item for having a top level, and one for tagging out to someone else's top level! Your SWEET LOOT will be included with your acceptance notice.

Additionally, characters currently in game can earn themselves a piece of bonus loot for the dungeon by tagging people's top-levels on the test drive! Existing characters get their bonus loot along with the rest of their loot at the conclusion of the dungeon.

This time, the Test Drive takes place in Incendia - a less-ruined-than-expected city that has been abandoned for over a century, due to the magical effects of the Fissure (unstable reality region) that have made it impossible to live in. What effects are these, you ask?

Well...

BY DAY

By day, the city is lovely, if oddly empty. The sun shines down, and magical lights along the sidewalk - the equivalent of power lines - flow energy throughout the city. It's possible to think that the little sparks you sometimes see at the corner of your vision are related. After all, there's a great deal of magic in the air...

But in spite of this, the city lies abandoned, for no immediately apparent reason. You might have found yourself in a wide-open shipping yard, where large metal containers levitate about, moving without any help or oversight from human hands. Be careful; these containers changing positions make it easy to get lost for quite a long time, since few of them have much in the way of identifying traits over than color. Didn't you already pass that arrangement of two red ones on top of a blue one before...?

Or perhaps you're in the massive park in the center of town, with its blatantly magical fountain (a half-dome of water just hanging in the air) and the tents of an abandoned festival. Two stages and a long line of street food booths stand empty - surely no one will mind if you use them for something, right?

Or perhaps you're just suddenly on the streets, among stalled-out taxis and cars that go nowhere and lack the familiar smell of gasoline. There's apartments and shops all around, with little gardens spilling out over balconies... Maybe if you go knock on some doors, you'll find people.

Wherever it is you are, surely there's got to be someone around who can tell you what's going on, right...?

BY DUSK

As night falls, rather than dropping the way you might expect, the temperature begins to rise. And then the sparks in the edges of your vision are very much more than simply at the edges of your vision. They catch first on the plants, the papers stuck to the now-lit magical streetlights, the trash cans... And then, increasingly so, on the buildings proper, the shops, the skyscrapers, the cars in the street.

Within half an hour, an inferno is starting to build, and it's clear that there's not going to be anywhere above ground safe from it. But fortunately, there's safety beneath the level of the streets - if you can make your way fast enough to an underground station.

BY NIGHT

In the remains of these subway tunnels, lit mostly by the dim glow of magical energy lines, you're at least safe from the inferno above. Unlike the aboveground parts of the city, however, the tunnels are in an obvious state of disrepair, with broken concrete, rot, and mildew. The stations might have once been clean, but they quite transparently are not now, and the tunnels themselves are as bad or worse.

Thankfully, no trains run anymore, so you're not at risk of being run down on the broken tracks. There's also not any full-on collapses blocking the way, and the tunnels seem well-enough made that there's probably not risk of a cave-in.

Less pleasantly, you aren't the only thing taking shelter in the tunnels from the firestorm above. And the magic of that flame has touched the feral dogs that rove the tunnels, turning them into barking, howling creatures of as much flame as flesh themselves. And then there's the occasional patch of mold, mildew, and slime in the darkest parts of the tunnels, where even the magical circuits have gone out, that moves to douse any light that comes near it...

Comments

[ax_iom]

[She's just going to reach up and flick Jail's head.]

We are not eating random magic food we just found.

[nor_iron_bars]

Awww, c'mon don't you wanna try some?

[Jail mock pouts, clearly not all that chastened by Lily's attempts at discipline.]

'Sides, I ate some of the other preserved stuff I found earlier and that hasn't done shit to me, so this place is probably fine too.

[ax_iom]

That hasn't done anything to you yet. Have you used your power on it?

[nor_iron_bars]

[Jail pauses a moment, staring at the pastry display case, blatantly taking a Look at it to cover up the fact that she hadn't earlier, before answering proudly:]

Yep, and it's totally safe, we're fine.

[ax_iom]

[She reaches up and... Well, that gas mask means she can't smoosh Jail's face. So instead she just pokes her in the forehead.]

Did you use your power on it before you ate it?

[nor_iron_bars]

[She makes absolutely no effort to avoid the forehead poke whatsoever. She knows better than to try by now.]

Whaddya mean, I haven't eaten anything here yet, see? All the stuff in this cafe is totally untouched. Look, they even got that shit with the strawberries and whipped cream on top, that stuff's great.

[Jail tries to sound innocent, but she isn't trying very hard.]

Anyway, the point ain't what I may or may not have eaten earlier today, it's that everything right here is safe and delicious, and we oughtta pick something out already. How about muffins, you want a muffin?

[ax_iom]

...

Something sweet.

[it's the most she's going to compromise...]

[nor_iron_bars]

[Underneath the mask, Jail grins. It's a... surprisingly genuine expression, compared to her usual deliberate show of gleeful mischief. She knows what Lily's legendary determination bending just a little sounds like.]

[She looks happily around the room, playful as a child, trying to pick out the perfect treat for her friend.]

Weeeeell, let's see what we got here. Looks like there's a lotta options for sweet- iced cookies, maybe some cake, or...

[She trails off as she spots it, in a tall display case just behind Lily, a couple shelves above her head. A snippet of memory drifts back to her- finishing up a Lighthouse mission sometime around dawn and driving around until they saw a little French-style breakfast cafe, just opening for business, and ordering the sugariest thing on the menu, the two of them wolfing down crispy sweetness covered in fruit and powdered sugar, sticky flavored syrup a deeper red than the berries.]

[She'd realized the flowers in the little vase on their table were lilies, and had teased her erstwhile mission partner about it, who'd retaliated by plucking one of the small white blooms out of the vase and reaching across the table to stick it in her hair. Jail had worn her friend's namesake flower tucked behind her ear for the rest of the day, not bothering to take it out until she'd finally gone to bed for the night.]

Oh hey, here's something just right.

[She takes advantage of her longer reach to lean up and snatch the plate of raspberry crepes off the shelf, presenting it to Lily with a flourish. Maybe they could both use a good memory right now.]

Ta-daaa~ Sweet as all get-out, and practically made for you. The color even matches your hair, see?

[ax_iom]

[... Was there ever a memory like that? Something small... Some happiness? She just couldn't remember. It was like a fog in her brain. Like something...

Father Cyriac's words still linger in her head. She was only making things worse. All she ever did was make things worse.

She looks at the scones, no trace of recognition of the crepes, or any such fond memories on her face.]

... It's better than nothing.

[nor_iron_bars]

Wow, there's high praise. Don't get too carried away or anything.

[Jail deflates a little internally, but she's not letting that discourage her. Sorry, Lily, you can't push her away that easily.]

'Kay, now it's your turn- I picked out something for you, so you get to pick out something for me.

[ax_iom]

Can't you just have the same thing?

[nor_iron_bars]

You wanna split this one, then?

[She eyes the plate of raspberry crepes speculatively.]

Looks like there's enough for two.

[ax_iom]

Good enough.

[She shrugs...]

Not really hungry.

[nor_iron_bars]

[And now they're down to sentence fragments. Probably not a good sign.]

[Jail puts the plate down on a nearby table, grabs a couple forks, and pulls out a chair for Lily to sit down on with a flourish of exaggerated courtesy.]

C'mon, at least try a bite. The last time I ate something this big by myself, Marco kept calling me a garbage disposal, remember? Don't need that again.

[ax_iom]

Marco just says stuff like that because he knows you can give back as good as you get.

[She sits, and takes a bite, at least...

The lack of reaction is. Probably alarming!]

[nor_iron_bars]

Rude and false- I give back way better than I get.

[Jail grins and unlocks the front panel of her mask to take a large bite of the crepes. Mm, raspberry. They're still warm, too.]

[Which makes Lily's total lack of a reaction all the more worrying.]

So, you wanna know something super weird 'bout this place?

[ax_iom]

I'm hallucinating it?

[it would be nice if that was true.]

[nor_iron_bars]

Probably not- and if you are then you're hallucinating me, too, so try to dream me something cool.

[Her tone is deceptively casual.]

Nah, the real weird thing is that time is kinda fucky here, compared to other worlds. People can get taken from lots of places in time, not just space. Maddie and I both remember being from the same time, but when Faith showed up she was from like a year in the future, to us- and we hadn't been gone at all, far as she knew.

[ax_iom]

Not convincing me that this place is real.

[what the fuck]

[nor_iron_bars]

If it's a fake, then it a damn good one- and I know from fake shit.

[See for example every ID she's ever made for you.]

So I figure I oughtta check, so we know when you're from- what's the last thing you remember?

[It's an innocent question... but it's got a hook in it, and Jail knows it. When Lily's from is important, maybe even more than it is for anyone else she knows, because she remembers what Faith told her.]

[She remembers finding out they almost lost her.]

[ax_iom]

[... Ah. She knows what's going on, and she sighs.]

... Darkest Night. I just killed Cyriac. And then...

[nor_iron_bars]

And then.

[The cheery calm bleeds out of Jail's voice, leaving it bleak and solemn.]

You wanna explain 'and then' to me? 'Cause I gotta say, I really don't like what I heard about 'and then'.

[ax_iom]

Then I revealed who I am.

[Her voice is cold.]

So, get on with it.

[nor_iron_bars]

...Okay.

[Jail's response is flat, her expression blank, and she puts down her fork with a decisive little clink of the metal against the plate. She gets up, walks around the table to stand in front of Lily for a long moment, then lunges forward suddenly-]

[To grab Lily in a hug.]

Who you are is a fucking dumbass who needs about three billion years worth of therapy, and I'm so fucking sorry we let it get this bad.

[With the front panel of her mask still off, the usual faint raspy undertone from her gasmask's filters is missing from her low, husky voice. Maybe that's why it's audible, the way her breath catches for a moment, right before her grip tightens.]

Should've done more, should've been a better friend, should've... fuck, I'm sorry.

[ax_iom]

Jail...?

[She goes stiff, and still. She doesn't seem to understand what's happening. But this is the most honest emotion she's heard from Jail in... ever, is it?]

Wha- What are you talking about? It's not- You didn't do anything wrong.