TEST DRIVE MEME #11

[expiationmods]

Test Drive Meme #11

Welcome to Expiation, a pan-fandom adventure game with elements of fantasy, science fiction, and some subtle horror.

THE STORY SO FAR (click to expand!)

Characters have arrived in Expiation, a seemingly idyllic fantasy world where they have been told they will be judged and sentenced for crimes they were charged with upon arrival.

Every two months, several characters are chosen for sentencing, where they’re brought to City Hall and told to perform a task related to their assigned crime.

Their only contact at City Hall is a mysterious and long-suffering man called Jerry.

Over time, characters have begun to realize that not all is as it seems in Expiation: as it turns out, the entire world is a simulation that seems to be run by an artificial intelligence.
This AI claims that its purpose, and thus the purpose of Expiation, is rehabilitating the Chosen after their crimes.

In March 2024, after the destruction of City Hall, the city of Aldrip was forced into an upgrade status. While this upgrade was being implemented, characters were pulled into a false reality where they believed they were natives to the city of Aldrip.

Aldrip has been a bit of a glitchy place for many, many months. However, in Summer 2024, these glitches became difficult to ignore, and pointed at evidence of a catastrophic systems failure. For several months, characters experienced chaotic effects as elements from their worlds and many others were thrown into the setting without warning, even going so far as to import a Gnosia infection.

The AI in charge of Expiation believed that performing a system reset might be the only way to stop the glitches before they could impact the world as a whole.

In September 2024, characters complied with the AI’s request and performed a reset. Although this set the AI back to a default state where it felt more neutral–rather than affectionate–toward the Chosen, several people created a system backup that they hope will return some of the data that has made the AI more sympathetic toward the Chosen.

When Aldrip was reset, City Hall became a Courthouse, and this is the new building where Chosen are now sent for sentencing.

TDM top-levels are open to all, whether you are already in-game or not. New characters, please put TDM in your subject header so we’ll know you’re trying things out! You can also put your top-level in the TDM DIRECTORY at the bottom of the post. New folks are welcome and encouraged to use TDM threads as samples in their application. Current players may use TDM threads as part of their AC proofs.

October's TDM takes place on October 21st.

You can view our CALENDAR to keep important dates in mind. RESERVES open on October 21 and APPLICATIONS will open on October 24. After this, applications will next open in December 2024.

Full Navigation

Arrival

Spooky season has come to Aldrip in full force! City and outskirts gardens are full of pumpkins to harvest, trees begin turning red and orange, and there’s a chill in the air that’d have anyone reaching for a cozy sweater. The wind picks up occasionally, howling through the trees, especially near the forest… While the seasonal weather is welcoming, the locals are anything but: they send disapproving glances and keep a wide distance. Unfortunately, this may only be heightened by the new arrivals to the city…

Newcomers to Aldrip face a rude awakening this month. Strange iron cages have appeared on surfaces all over town, short and tall alike, and this is where new Chosen find themselves upon arrival. The cages themselves aren’t terribly hard to open, honestly; the latch is on the outside, and it’s a bit finicky, but it’s not locked or anything. That said, some of these cages are quite high up. They’re sometimes near ledges and windows, but not always, and some new Chosen might need a helping hand to get down.

Yeah. The optics aren’t great. No wonder the locals are a little nervous!

The fall carnival

On the morning of October 21st, a Fall carnival pops up, seemingly out of nowhere. It hasn’t been well-advertised–maybe a flyer or two around town–but luckily for the Chosen, those who work there don’t seem to have the same opinion of them as the locals do. Costumes are not required for the carnival, but they’re definitely encouraged! There is a large tent near the entrance with lots of costumes to choose from, and changing rooms as well, should the Chosen decide they’d like to give it a try. The tent workers will be so excited to help with this process–but they might find some very unexpected choices for the Chosen!

There are plenty of rides, games, and food stalls, so come on down! Some special attractions the Chosen may take note of include:

The Funhouse
Billed as a standard house of mirrors, the Chosen are encouraged to try to get through the maze as quickly as they can. Push your limits! Test yourself!

Inside the mirror maze, the Chosen will find more of a test than they might have expected, at first. As they go deeper into the maze, the mirror reflections seem to change. At first, it’s just little things: your reflection might look in a different direction, or move when you stand still. But deeper within the maze, these mirrors begin to show things about the Chosen that they might not be ready to admit just yet. Some reflections may try to confess to the character’s crime to anyone who may be in the funhouse, even going into detail about it. Some may even show the crime as it happened, or a warped version of that crime. Anyone present can see and hear these reflections.

The reflections will follow Chosen until they find their way out of the funhouse. Unfortunately, that could take quite a bit longer, since those reflections are so very vocal and distracting.

Pumpkin Pick-up
You know those duck games at a fair where you pick up a rubber duck and the bottom of the toy has a prize written on it? Well, we know better than to pick up a duck in a dungeon carnival here in Expiation, so for extra spooky flair, these are small pumpkins instead, with painted jack-o-lantern faces! Picking up a pumpkin should reveal a prize…but what’s this? It’s a challenge instead? Interesting.

Written on the underside of each pumpkin is a truth-or-dare style directive. Players are free to make up any challenge they want, here! If you’re looking for some ideas, we’ve provided some examples in the details cut below.

Click here for a list of example challenges!

Tell someone your biggest regret
Tell someone about the scariest moment you’ve ever had
Confess your deepest shame to a stranger
Take someone’s shoes
Attempt to pickpocket someone without them noticing
Find a stranger and show off a secret talent
Tell someone about the thing you hate most, deep down
Kiss or hug a stranger
Eat something that doesn’t look like food
Tell someone about the cruelest thing you have ever done
Start dancing in the middle of a crowd, but only if there’s no music playing
Tell a stranger about the worst lie you ever told
Ask a stranger out on a date
Set off a small firework without warning
Give away your shirt and do not replace it
Confess your greatest weakness
Put on an extra silly costume
Exchange clothes with a stranger

You get the idea! Feel free to use these as a jumping off point and make up your own–there are no limits to what the pumpkins might say. Once the task has been completed, Chosen may turn the pumpkins in at one of the prize booths for whatever prize they would like. There’s no visible indication on the pumpkin as to whether the task is done or not, so you’re welcome to try bluffing, if you don’t want to complete it…but somehow, the booth worker always seems to know.

Dueling Potions
One of the stalls is a game of chance: two identical potions sit before you on a table. The carnie claims that one is a luck potion, and that choosing that potion will give you excellent luck for the whole day…but how do you tell which is which? By drinking the potion, of course!

There’s a 50% chance of victory, here. One vial does indeed contain a good luck potion, and if you choose that vial, your luck will be incredible for the next 24 hours. Unfortunately, the other bottle contains a bad luck potion, and that will have the opposite effect: for 24 hours, you’ll be plagued by disaster, bad happenstance, and maybe even some extra clumsiness. Does it seem a bit like you need to have good luck to get good luck, here? What, is this a commentary on something? Hmm.

Fortune Teller
Want some woo in your spooky season? A midnight-blue tent covered in stars seems to invite you in. You’ll find a bonafide fortune teller within, complete with crystal ball and heady incense. How fun! They’ll give you a cursory reading, either by palm or with strange-looking cards. You get the feeling that this reading is fairly accurate, but strangely…it’s hard to recite details later, if you try to tell someone else about what they told you. How odd. Maybe it was the incense.

It’s not just a hazy fortune and a nose full of frankincense that Chosen leave this booth with: they also feel a compulsion to speak their minds more than they might otherwise. Whether this is telling secrets usually kept close to the vest, expressing their opinions more readily, readily admitting to crimes they’ve been charged with or other wrongdoings, or some other manifestation of this effect is up to players!

There are plenty of other games, rides, and booths to explore, many of which have perfectly standard fare for events like these. Characters can use these booths to win tickets and get prizes: many booths offer cute stuffies and kitschy toys, of course, but Chosen can also find useful items like weapons, food, clothing, accessories, and things like that.

Witch hunt

Last year’s Witch Hunt was metaphorical in nature–this year, it’s much more literal. A limited number of witch hats are placed on a table in front of the carnival. As soon as the clock strikes noon, the Chosen may grab one and try to keep it out of the hands of fellow competitors. These hats are first-come, first-served, but it really doesn’t matter who starts out with one–it’s who ends the hunt with one that counts!

It seems to be like a city-wide game of tag. The Chosen’s job is simple: obtain and keep a witch hat on their head until the clock strikes midnight. If a “witch” is caught by another Chosen (by way of being tagged), they must hand over their hat, or they’ll be disqualified.

There’s no official sign-up for the hunt, so characters can join in whenever they’d like, or may decide not to join at all. So, what’s this all for? Anyone who manages to have a witch hat on by the time the clock strikes midnight is guaranteed a prize! OOCly, this prize is any small non-magical item from home, either personal or not; ICly, Chosen will not know what this prize is before entering. How do you obtain this prize? There’s an RNG for those who would like a chance to sign up to win an item. Sign-up is optional, and TDMers are welcome to join in! New items will be delivered at the start of November, so any new applicants who win the hunt will be able to obtain their items as well.

Wildcard

Make your own fun! Just because it’s not in the prompts doesn’t mean it’s not possible. Have at it! Go crazy! Try not to break anything (too much)!

♡

Comments

1

[arachnerina]

[Gwen wasn't leaving the house much these days. She's begrudgingly starting to accept that Peter is gone, or at least, at the minimum stuck in the backup data...that they can't access. For someone that had spent so long pushing people away, Peter had wormed his way into her heart so quickly and so effortlessly. And now, losing him so suddenly was throwing her right back to the pain she had felt when she lost her Peter, and again when she got separated from Miles and the other Peters.

She still had a Peter, not to mention a number of other friends that were trying to support her right now, but that didn't stop the pain. Just numbed it, very temporarily.

The changes in town were at least somewhat distracting, as she swung through the streets to head home after helping in STEM club for a little while. She thought she would be spending Halloween doing normal teen things with Peter, but this world had different plans, and--

Wait.

Hang on.

Shit, that sure wasn't a Halloween decoration in that cage, was it??

Gwen swung back around, landing on top of the metal cage and looking down at the man and immediately regretting it oh god. She's just casually looking away and avoiding eye contact now for reason!!]

Dude, where are your clothes?!

[liverletdie]

Oh.

[ Processing, processing, processing. ]

You're new.

[ Yeah, that's what she's getting. It's taking him a long few minutes to figure out who she is, and where she came from. Different world? More than likely, but not always a given, particularly since Spider-Man's always got something or the other going on. Clones, friends, new people with spider powers... the possibilities are endless, and while he isn't quite sure who this one is... that doesn't mean that he isn't going to just.

Well.

Keep being himself. ]

Oh, the clothing. Yeah, showed up without it. [ A pause, a tip of his head, thinking. ] See, the thing is, when you are inside a powerful suit, sometimes, kidnappers like to find a way to get one out of it. You know, to make these things easier.

You get used to it.

[arachnerina]

Me? Um. Nope. Pretty sure you're the new one, here. [Don't mind if she flips herself down to a better vantage point at the side of the cage now. From the brief moment she looked at him, he seemed... familiar? Is that the right word? But she can't really explain it yet, she's more focused on how to get the cage open without seeing anything that will scar her for life.]

This happens to you often? [That sure is Something. She's not sure what to think about that. She's also still not looking at him, or wasn't, until he mentioned the powerful suit.

Wait.

No way.]

Hold up. Are you-- Tony Stark? [He doesn't have powerful suits in her dimension, but she's had to listen to Peter ramble about his Tony endlessly. Not to mention she's seen what the Iron Spider can do and it's pretty impressive. Her dimension's Tony? He's just a privatized military guy that sells coffee on the side. But it is damn good coffee, and probably why this guy looks familiar.]

[liverletdie]

Hey, I love coming to a place where everyone already knows who I am.

[ he says, with a smile that is too camera-perfect. He still hasn't decided to show a lick of shame about the rest of his circumstance, but go figure. ]

So, you going to share your name too? Or am I left to guess? I'd say Spider-Girl or Spider-Woman but I know both of those are taken.

[ Is there a shred of doubt that she's Spider-Adjacent? No, absolutely not. Look at that mask. ]

[arachnerina]

Isn't that basically your MO? [She doesn't have to be from the universe where he's a superhero to know Tony Stark has made a name for himself and very much likes everyone to know it. There's money in branding, and having a coffee shop with your name on it on every corner.]

Yeah, it's taken by me. In my dimension, I'm the one and only Spider-Woman, thank you very much. [It's fake pride in saying that, it's actually incredibly lonely and she honestly loves being around other spider-people.]

But you can call me Gwen. Secret identities kinda don't work around here, so. Also-- any chance you have one of those special nanobot suits that materialize once I break you out of here, or do I need to go buy you some pants?

[liverletdie]

[ She's taking all the fun out of it!!

She can see it on his face, the way it quirks and turns down into a slight frown. ]

Well, I could play coy, but I have something that will do in a pinch.

[ He leaned to look down at the ground. ]

Won't the locals get a little... distressed? I mean, you're in your whole...flashy getup, but mines a little more... unusual.

Probably can't play it off as nice fabric, you know?

[arachnerina]

Great! Then lets fix your problem, before I want to claw out my own eyes.

[She gets the hesitancy about not wanting to make a scene. She was honestly hesitant about the whole not-keeping-her-identity-a-secret thing here, too, but honestly? The locals...really didn't care?? Their opinions on the Chosen seemed to vary month to month, but they really weren't phased by much.]

My-- [goddamn, it's so hard to talk about Peter without getting upset, but she can suck it up.] My boyfriend was running around in one of your Iron Spider suits for the last several months, so. I think you're probably safe with whatever wild tech you've got with you. Plus, there's a ton of other heroes too. Not sure if your dimension has X-Men, but there's like... five of them here?

[It literally takes half a second to break the damn lock open, too. Realizing who he was was just distracting, okay!! But now that it's actually open, she sure is going to web herself out of the way so he can do whatever crazy Iron Man thing he has in his nonexistent pocket and so she doesn't have to get any visuals that will ruin her day.]

[liverletdie]

[ So, there's a lot to take in.

If he doesn't have to worry about his suit, well, he'll pull that from somewhere high above where it's flying. It'll take a second though, he doesn't need it to set off the characteristic 'Boom, boom, BOOM' that it usually does. ]

So I have X-Men, and what do you mean your boyfriend has the Iron Spider suit? I made that for Spider-Man until he... well. It's complicated, and I'm not really keen on sharing that story with a stranger. No offense.

[ He could deal with a lot, the alternate universes, the everything. That's fairly normal. What he struggles with is the fact that there is a Spider-Man still using his tech. He'd forwent that right when he'd decided to rescind his cooperation with the SHRA.

His lips twitched, and he finally shifted. From the insides of his bones, he deploys the undersuit, which thankfully covers...everything uncomfortable, if just. He looked up at the sky. ]

Incoming, might want to get back a bit further.

[ Okay, it's still pretty fast. One Boom, before a remote-controlled suit breaks the clouds. ]

[arachnerina]

My boyfriend is Spider-Man. Or. Was-- a Spider-Man. This place likes to play with the multiverse, so we've had two for a little while. He..left, recently, but he got it from you-- or his Tony Stark, anyway. Before... all of this trouble we've found ourselves in.

[Vague gestures at Aldrip!! She's honestly making herself confused trying to explain all this. She isn't sure if this is Peter's Tony. It's hard to say, but the fact that he gave an Iron Spider suit to his Spider-Man is intriguing. She wishes Peter were here, because if it was? Damn. She knows how important Tony is to him, and how much he wants to prove he deserves that damn suit.

Tony honestly didn't have to warn her. Her eyes were one hundred percent closed at the first hint of him moving, nanobot undersuit or not, but her spider-sense went off and she could hear the suit circling. She reacted quickly, webbing herself even further out of the way, but it was only then that she dared to look over at Tony again. Thank god he was decent, because she sure was being nosy about what was about to happen.]

[liverletdie]

Right, right, just like home. That's not so confusing, thankfully. I'm used to that.

[ A roll of his shoulders. ] You get drunk with Reed Richards a few times, and suddenly you understand the depth of the multiverse.

[ He held up a hand to her, as if in warning. ] Seriously, I can't tell anyone not to drink, because I was not the picture of restraint when I did; but do not under any circumstances, ever get Mister Fantastic drunk.

[ A roll of his shoulders, and the suit just kind of...

Fell apart in mid air, pieces hovering, before he just kind of jumped out into the open air, the pieces and parts of it reshaping to form over the undersuit. The helmet face sort of hovered above his head.

It's neat! ]

There. Now, you said Spider-Man is gone, which is a shame. I'd like to get his side of the story of why he's wearing that suit right now.

Is he... uh. Away on business? Dead? Just... doing Spider-related things?

[arachnerina]

[Mister Fantastic...? Yeah, she has no idea who that is. But with how much Peter rambled about his home dimension and name-droped heroes and people she never recognizes, she's just going to slow-nod and let Tony ramble.

Oh hey! Suit time!

...Okay, so she sees the appeal. That was pretty damn neat, watching it separate and reassemble itself in a matter of minutes. Was this how Tony was, in Peter's dimension?]

I told you? You gave it to him. [There's a story to it? She's heard just about all of Peter's stories by this point, so she's a little confused. I mean, there's definitely a story, but not one that she knows of that would make it complicated between them like the vibe she's getting from Tony right now.]

He said you made it for him before he was supposed to join the Avengers, but he turned it and the Avengers down, but then Thanos happened, and you gave it to him again when you went to space with-- Dr. Strange and the Guardians of the Galaxy? [Peter's world is so much. Sometimes it sounds like utter nonsense, especially when it's her that's repeating it.]

He was here, but... he disappeared. Which means he probably went home, right back to Thanos. He used the Infinity Stones, so he's... yeah.

[liverletdie]

Huh.

[ none of that sounded right. It's not like he hasn't been to space before (several times) but he didn't tend to spend much time ever with the Guardians, and Stephen? Please. He hated magic. ]

Yeah, that didn't happen. Not to me, anyway. I made him the suit, yes, but it was well after he joined the Avengers. Spider-Man recently... turned down its use.

[ To be fair, he made it and controlled it. Of course he did. ]

So let's slow down, because I know for a fact that all of the infinity stones are perfectly safe, Thanos hasn't been around in... [ A pull of his lips. ] Forever, either.

So good to know, this is probably an alternate universe to mine. Which... at least answers a lot of my questions about him.