tdm 19

[savmods]

test drive meme

Ingress travel can be disorienting, but there’s no need to worry! All side effects are temporary and lessen with each trip. Your body may experience several sensations at once: being pushed forward as if a hand is resting on your back, momentary and startling blindness, a gentle ringing in your head. You may have difficulty discerning whether it is hot or cold, but where you have been prodded is noticeably warmer than the rest of you. Some may suffer from dizziness while others are perfectly fine. You notice that the area you are in is filled with a soft cerulean light and feels slightly humid and dark despite the glow around you. Regardless of your current state, however, the stress of initial Ingress travel forces your body into unconsciousness.

Waking up is another story. Or maybe it isn’t.

You find yourself in a nondescript room; sometimes with others who have found themselves in the same situation, sometimes alone. A medical tech is always present to explain what’s happened before giving you some clothes, a TAB, and a guide that discusses things in further detail. This entire process also consists of a complete work-up of medical history and current health in order to obtain your signature—a specific frequency that will allow them to hone in on exactly where it is you’re from in order to get you back there. You spend your first week on the Ingress Complex while other accommodations and arrangements are made for you. The techs and others in the facility seem strangely frazzled and tired, but if asked, they reassure you that nothing is wrong, the danger has passed and everyone is all right now.

welcome to thisavrou

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escoria

⋆ Escoria is classified as Exploration Class (EC), and travel through the Ingress is mostly smooth except for one issue: anyone with powers or abilities will find that the distortion between worlds has temporarily caused problems accessing them. Essentially, it has left all travelers depowered. Another similar issue comes in the form of the location of Escoria’s Ingress—seemingly in the middle of a vast ocean, the Ingress is balanced precariously on a set of buoys connected to a small floating dock. Once on this dock, it is clear there is no getting anywhere without some transportation. Testing the dark waters will find it unbearably cold, though not cold enough to form ice, and far off in the distance, between the mist and ever-constant gray light - where’s the sun? - some might even notice what looks like an island.

⋆ The boat that eventually comes to your rescue isn’t very big, one of a fleet used to transport visitors from the floating Ingress platform. Only a few passengers are allowed on each one--a maximum of six. The boat’s captain is quite insistent that each group remain small, handing out blankets to those who did not come prepared for the chill. It isn’t too much trouble as there are a great many boats and plenty of natives to pilot them. The weather is cool, the skies are dark with rain that might fall, but for now things seem alright. Leaning out on the rail, you might see some shark-like sea creatures breaching the surface to breathe. Of course, you might also see quicksilver figures darting underneath the water from the corner of your eye, which is then followed by a sharp rocking of the boat. Did something nudge the vessel? Maybe you ought to make sure people stay back from the sides in case they fall in...

⋆ Despite the calm appearance of the sky, the worst has happened. A storm hits at just the right time to drive your boat against one of the multitudinous reefs, roughly jarring its passengers, and then, the waves continue to batter the ship against it until it falls to pieces. You get lucky and find a piece of debris to hold onto to keep your head above the water until the storm passes, although it’s some time before even a calm comes. Once it does, you have to deal with the facts: you’re stranded with minimal supplies, all alone except for the other people who were on board with you when the ship went down in the waves. And what’s worse, the water isn’t getting any warmer. What do you do to survive until help, hopefully, arrives? Will you make an attempt to swim to shore or wait for someone to send another boat?

⋆ The few who manage to weather the storm and make it to one of the few islands of Escoria are, indeed, lucky. What lies beneath the surface of those dark waters is much more dangerous and deadly. Distant cousins of Thisavrou’s native Gorgona of Region Four, these nameless creatures are ruthless as they hunt. They slither the shallow surfaces of the reefs spread out across Escoria, waiting for even the slightest ripple of water to alert them to their prey. At first, looking into the water reveals nothing. Then, the closer these things come to the surface, the faster it begins to change and look as if something familiar, something you long for is calling to you. It can be a person, alive or dead, or it could be something intangible like a goal waiting to be fulfilled or an object waiting to be touched. This is how they lure the unsuspecting below the surface, and once they have their claws in you, it’s very difficult to escape. The urge to be with them is impossibly strong regardless of the fact that no one can hold their breath for that long or survive the deep cold of the water for longer than a few minutes.

Your only chance of escape? Someone who might have noticed that you’d suddenly slipped under without a sound. Or, if by chance, you manage to snap off a piece of the coral in the reefs. It changes with the shape of the holder, and that, if you’re lucky, might be the very weapon that saves you.

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OUT OF CHARACTER INFO

FAQ | LOCATIONS | RESERVES | APPLICATIONS | NAVIGATION

For mature or graphic content, please label.For questions, please direct them to the FAQ or the Feedback page. Any scenarios listed (unless otherwise indicated) can be used as game canon. As always, be kind and have fun!

Comments

[shiro2hero]

We just hit the edge of our solar-system, space travel wise, if that helps anything.

[He holds out a hand again.]

Does relating mean I get to call you something besides "Purple Armor"?

[sightsset]

Solar system? Whew, you've got a long ways to go.

[North more comfortably takes that hand this time, clearly satisfied with the answers and the attitude of the young man in front of him.]

You can call me North.

[shiro2hero]

Yeah. Earth really does.

[But part of him has started to hope they don't. Not until the war is won.]

[He smiles a little more, then, with the second handshake.]

Well, nice to meet you officially. I'm still Shiro.

[sightsset]

Nice to meet you, too. Sorry about the runaround. You don't exactly hear about dimensional travel every day.

[He's gonna retract the hand and rest it on his hip, head tilted to one side.]

In my line of work, it's better to be safe than sorry.

[shiro2hero]

It's no problem -- When I first showed up, I tried to deck the first person I saw.

[Which happened to be Lucio, so... fortunate the guy was kind enough to forgive him, in the long run.]

Are you a soldier? Something like that?

[Because armor.]

[sightsset]

Panicking tends to lead to more trouble than it's worth to me.

[When you have a person in your head with you it tends to be a little harder to react to things strongly like that. Especially when said person is a construct of someone's trust, and said someone was not exactly treated well.]

Something like that, yeah. You?

[shiro2hero]

Sort of wished everyone felt that way.

[Especially the Savrii, lately. Not that he can really blame the natives, but still.]

Here? I'm a pilot. [Said with no small amount of wry pride.] Before this... something like that, too.

[sightsset]

[Good enough for him. They don't have to talk about work, and North would prefer they didn't for long.]

A pilot, huh? What kind of work do they have people doing here?

[shiro2hero]

Really, anything we can find. I've been doing shuttle runs between here and the ground. Sometimes cargo, sometimes evacuation.

[He shrugs, like this is no big deal.]

I'm just glad to be in a cockpit again, so I may have quit looking as soon as I found this.

[sightsset]

Evacuation?

[Now that gets his attention.]

What are people running from?

[shiro2hero]

Would you believe me if I said "monster of the week"?

Because that's what it feels like sometimes.

[sightsset]

... You sure we're not playing monster hunter for the natives, then?

[shiro2hero]

Not unless you want to.

... We've tried to, my team and I. Make ourselves less like refugees.

[sightsset]

Your team?

[He's gotta ask; that's a word he relates to heavily.]

[shiro2hero]

My team. They're pretty much all here. Me and six others. Five of us from our universe, one we added here.

[Easiest way to explain it, to be honest.]

Three of us, myself included, we've been here almost a year, by their standards.

[sightsset]

... That many people from your world ended up here?

[The pretense is lost; North is clearly thinking about how that could be applied to himself.]

[shiro2hero]

It happens, sometimes. People come in clusters who all know each other.

[The look on his face flicks between something relieved, and something sadder.]

... sometimes I think we're lucky. Other times, I know we're needed back there. Double-edged thing, huh?

[sightsset]

Needed? Your world's in trouble?

[Info-fishing or not, that's real concern.]

[shiro2hero]

More like the entire universe.

[And he's completely serious, there.]

... so yeah. You could say our planet's in trouble.

[sightsset]

... Must be different Earths, then. We're looking at the 2550's where I'm from.

[And no "barely reaching the solar system's edge" space pilots ever talked about the universe ending.]

[shiro2hero]

It probably is.

The other people from Earth here -- that aren't part of my team -- we've all just sort of accepted that.

[sightsset]

I wonder why that is...

[He rubs the back of his neck a little bit, massaging over the bodysuit at the joint.]

What's causing all the trouble where you're from?

[shiro2hero]

Why multiple earths? Who knows. It's some part of the Ingress -- and I haven't been studying it, to be honest with you.

[That's more Pidge's area than his.]

... Empire threatening to kill or conquer the entire universe. Wiping out anyone who stands up to them.

You?

[sightsset]

[Ah.]

Something similar, but on a smaller scale. Humans waging war; you know how we never quite change enough to stop doing that.

[shiro2hero]

Yeah. That seems like it's universal, huh?

[Kind of makes you wish they could at least... realize what else was out there. If not meeting it directly. Maybe it would help something.]