folkmeme | October-November 2024 Test Drive Meme

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October-November 2024 Test Drive Meme

October-November 2024 Test Drive

Introduction

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This Test Drive meme is open to all.
Welcome to Folkmore's monthly Test Drive Meme! Please feel free to test drive any and all characters regardless of your intent to apply or whether you have an invite or not. All TDMs are game canon and work like "mini-events". For new players and characters, you can choose to have your TDM thread be your introduction thread upon acceptance or start fresh. Current players are also allowed to have in-game characters post to the TDM so long as they mark their top levels ‘Current Character.’

TDM threads can be used for spoon spending at any time by characters accepted into the game.

Playing and interacting with the TDMs will allow characters to immediately obtain canon items from homes especially weapons or other things they may have had on their person when they were pulled from their worlds! There will always be a prompt that provides some sort of "reward" to characters who complete certain tasks.

Current players are always encouraged to tag new people on the TDM!
🦊 New Star Children meet the Fox still in their worlds, and she brings them into the new realm of Folkmore. As you follow her, your body begins to change and new characteristics emerge. These may stay for a while, or perhaps they will hide away after. And during all of this, the Fox explains to you where you will be going: to Folkmore. Then you fall like a shooting star, falling to the land in a burst of starlight.

🦊 Experienced Star Children are already familiar with this time of the month. There are shooting stars all across the sky, and some fall to the land, which means the Fox has brought new arrivals. These newly arrived Star Children will face some tests, but Thirteen wants the more seasoned residents to participate as well.

[ Prompt One ★ Prompt Two]

After the Storm . ★

Content Warnings: Natural Disaster/Natural Disaster Relief

It seems as if the Star Children will be restricted to Amrita Academy forever, when nothing changes at the one month mark. Yet, after another week has stretched endlessly past, a morning dawns to show that the moat of Lorasses has vanished. The way is clear to discover what the chaotic storms have left behind.

Most of Folkmore's resident spirits return. Good thing Catbus is among them because the train is not operating. Debris litters the tracks throughout the land. Someone's going to have to work to clean all of that up before normal schedules can resume... within the first week or so, everyone fervently hopes.

That is far from the only wreckage from those storms. As Star Children have seen, even Amrita Academy hasn't really been spared; between the Lorasses moat and the various structures built to weather the storms, the past weeks have left a mark on the school.

Other regions show clear signs of the warping they have endured similarly.

Wintermute alternated between blinding light and pitch blackness, with mountains growing and crumbling away alike. Cabins were transformed into igloos.
Willow experienced all the seasons in a matter of days multiple times, growing crops and new trees, losing old ones, and its buildings weathered as though through decades.
In Epiphany, the streets ran with water so high it was difficult to walk, and the buildings shifted to reflect related settings.
Cruel Summer grew hotter and more oppressive, so that survival away from the Selkie River was impossible. On the 13th, there was an explosion, and it rained robot parts.
Exile was swallowed entirely by the Swamp of Sorrows, leaving no dry land.
Tides filled with water, dark deep water that could not readily be seen through.
Never Fade became even more purple, with a thick haze that erased visibilty of borders. It also became steeper, so there was no flat ground.

The rest of Willow shows signs of extreme growth and age, as if decades, not weeks, have passed. Epiphany and Tides suffer major flood damage, and Exile is entirely soggy and saturated with a sense of sorrow. Avalanche debris covers Wintermute, and the mountains aren't in the same place. Cruel Summer is even dryer, cracked, and in part of it littered with exploded, partially melted robot parts. Never Fade may be the best off; the ground has leveled off, and only the unsecured outdoor items have crashed around or dropped off the island. In general, all regions show signs of warping.

Talaria has been outright knocked down (once again) and will need to be rebuilt (once again). The contents of Talarian homes have been thriftily saved by Thirteen (yet again). They'll be back as soon as the homes are ready to be redecorated! There's also a new elevator connecting Tides to a platform in the ocean at surface level, making it a little bit easier to get in or out of the neighborhood. Fly, swim, or use a boat from Nereid marina to reach it.

Many of the buildings throughout Folkmore, businesses and residences alike, have been damaged, some past the point of habitability. For better or worse, some residences will wait unclaimed, as their resident spirits have not returned from wherever they went while gone from Folkmore. Newly arriving Star Children (or those interested in relocating) just might find those residences awfully appealing. As with all unoccupied homes in Folkmore, they're free real estate.

Each neighborhood has a new (and structurally-sound) building near its center: a hospitality station of sorts, stocked with basic foods (to suit a variety of dietary needs, relevant to the known local residents), clean water, personal protective equipment, basic tool kits, fresh clothing, and clean linens. For those ill equipped to cook for themselves for whatever reason, there's also a canteen/soup kitchen area. The canteen tends to collect idle spirits and Star Children who might be willing to assist with any cleanup tasks too big or too complex for one person to tackle on their own.

Working with the neighbors has an additional benefit, of course: sooner or later, whether while helping clear the train tracks or fixing up someone's home or business (including a Star Child's own), shifting the debris will reveal a weathered container of some sort, locked up tight, that will only fall open at a touch if and when the right Star Child finds it. There is only one chest per Star Child. Inside, is an item from home, either that of the resident whose house/business it's found in or the one keyed to the lock. It may even be a magical item or weapon.

There's some good news as well, in the midst of all the chaos: most Star Children will find that their homes are wholly unharmed; their pets, companions, Pokémon, etc. are all hale and hearty, having spent the entire time cozily asleep in their boxfoxes — which can be reused if kept, and just as easily abandoned now that they've released their occupants.

The moat is gone! Freeeeeedom!
The train is not operating for one week until October 27th due to debris over the tracks.
Every region of Folkmore shows scars from the past month's extreme disturbances. Things have not reverted to before.
Most spirits have returned; some remain absent. Claim the free real estate, if quick or bold enough.
Hospitality stations have appeared in each neighborhood stocked with food, water, clothing, and linens.
The canteens serve as a social hub and place to ask for/volunteer assistance.
One time only, cleaning up or moving debris will reveal a container holding an item from home: yours or the person's you're helping.
Most Star Children's homes will be unharmed; any damage should match the region's damage flavor. The level of destruction is up to you.
Creatures in boxfoxes are out, fine and dandy! Boxfoxes can be kept/used again.

Dream of the Blue Turtle . ★

Offshore near Agrona Academy, there's something new. Something bewildering, maybe. Something growing. There's also something swimming up to any Star Children near the coast: a very large sea turtle, not willing to come far ashore. She's singing and chirping to get attention, in case being big enough to have a six-foot-long shell isn't quite good enough for some reason. (Or the way she has a blue-green bioluminescent glow when underwater, as becomes quite visible around dusk.)

She's happy to explain that she needs a place to lay her eggs. She doesn't have eggs to lay, just yet, but she wants to have her place all ready anyway. To that end she's busily building a brand-new island not very far from shore. It's just over there, visible once she indicates it with a flipper, barely any higher than the waves cresting around it. Here's the sad part: while she's used a great deal of cleverness in building it, from rocks and sand and bits of broken reef, she's all out of construction materials that she can reach! So she needs help: more construction material for the island.

It seems she's got a very loose definition, though, so pretty much anything that can later be covered in sand or dirt is fair game. Lucky that she wants it now. There's a perfect place to ~~dump all that debris in the ocean~~ recycle all the debris, anything not structurally sound enough for a repair-in-place job. Bigger is probably better, too. Work together with other Star Children to haul up the big stuff. It brings more and more joy to her songs as she finds the exact place for each and every item, making her island grow bigger and bigger.

Anyone who actively participates will be rewarded five (5) spoons by the turtle directly, as a thank you for helping her to keep her eggs safe. (If anyone asks, she'll explain that it's the number of limbs she has, so she thought it was perfect!) In addition, she gives each person a smooth and shiny sea rock that fits in their palm perfectly! If the island gets big enough to be more than a sandbar, anyone who helped with the construction will find it far more welcoming than those who didn't. She isn't expecting to use anything but the beach.

A large sea turtle—with a 6 foot in diameter shell and about 3 feet tall at the shoulder—starts building an island off Cruel Summer.
She needs help getting more building supplies. Bring your debris, bigger the better, here!
All Star Children who help will be rewarded five (5) spoons and a shiny and smooth rock from underwater that fits in their recipients' palms just so.
Star Children who help find the island more welcoming than those who didn't.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I don't have any doubt that you can. You were doing a pretty good job before you took a break. I mean, lets be honest, that branch probably weighs as much as you do and that's a pretty good feat. Not everyone can move their own body weight. Not to mention it's an awkward shape. Honestly, as much as I want to help because my mother taught me better than to just watch a lady do something, I think it'd be kinda insulting if I did.

( She's irritated and he can tell that so he wants to try to make her laugh. )

You move stuff often or is this a one time thing?

[ Daphne isn’t familiar with the concept of feminism, or proto-feminism. Before her time, and it’s more up Eloise’s alley anyways. What she does have is a sense of pride and far too much obstinance in her blood, which is what guides her emotions now.

She does have a regiment of mild exercise to explain how far she’s gotten with her stick, but she doesn’t divulge that information. Instead, she leans back on her trunk and tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear, self-consciously. ]

No. [ Look, she can be civil. Even if she’s not exactly charmed by this stranger. She was raised to be polite.

Flustered, she rambles on: ] What I mean to say is — I’m trying to be of service. Isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing?

No, you're not wrong. We're supposed to be helping each other out. Look, if it doesn't bother you for me to help, I'm happy to put myself to work. I just don't like to insert myself into situations where I'm not needed and offend someone.

( She's a beautiful woman, even winded and leaning against a tree with disheveled hair, and he offers his hand to her to shake it. )

I'm Bucky. I should have led with that.

[ She doesn’t say as much, but once her irritation subsides, she quickly catalogues he looks like the kind of person who can do this manner of work without breaking a sweat. Actually. He’s much bigger than she is. Than Simon, even.

Daphne, unused to being alone with men that aren’t her brothers or Simon, suddenly remembers herself and blushes.

She eyes his proffered hand for a couple of seconds before acting on the manners instilled in her from birth and breeding. Lightly, she places her hand into it, fully expecting him to kiss it as a gentleman would. ]

My name is Daphne. [ He doesn’t offer last names so she thinks it prudent maybe she shouldn’t either. To smooth over any of her earlier roughness, she tries for humor. ] And I’m rarely wrong.

( Daphne doesn't shake his hand when he offers it and he takes a glance at her dress and figures out that maybe she's from an earlier time period (imagine that) and probably has a much better family name than his. He takes a chance and kisses the back of her hand before dropping it. )

Well, if you're rarely wrong and I'm rarely wrong, then who is gonna cover the five percent where we're both wrong?

[ She smiles automatically because she expects no differently — the culture shock has not quite hit her like a brick yet — and dips her head demurely. Her anger melts away. Maybe she was wrong to take such instant offense. ]

My sister Eloise would suffice. At least, she would think as much. [ There is an exasperated edge to her voice, the kind saved for siblings. A pang hits her chest. What if her family isn’t here? What if they were? It hadn’t occurred to her to consider she may be all alone. ]

It is kind of you to offer your… brawn, but I dare say I should probably do this myself. It feels imperative that I must do something.

I can't say I don't admire the willingness to pitch in and help but you don't have to destroy your dress or break something to prove a point. What if I just helped you with it but you could still move the thing? Is that acceptable or do I need to stand over here and just watch?

( Bucky doesn't particularly want to offend her but she's also incredibly small and delicate and that makes him want to show off and move a bunch of shit around so she'll be impressed. That's probably a stupid train of thought, considering, but while he's 106, he's not dead. She's a pretty woman. )

I'm really only good at hauling around heavy stuff so you're gonna put me out of business over here.

[ Upon his remark, her gaze falls to her gown. The pink returns to her cheeks. ]

I can surmise that I am not dressed for the occasion. You needn’t remind me.

[ Still blushing. She huffs a little, at a loss. Like any Bridgerton, she is stubborn to fault, but she’s also quite tired now. ]

And am I to gather the leaves?

[ Actually, probably not a bad idea altogether, but she’s likely not suited for that job either. ]

It's probably a decent division of labor.

( Bucky waits a moment and gives her a softer look. She reminds him of how Steve used to be before they both got experimented on and became something a little more than human. She wants to do it herself. That had been clear from the start, considering her fairly-decent attempts at trying to move the tree limb, but now she's in a position where he wants to help and she's got pride. )

You can gather up the leaves. Or...I can break this thing into more manageable pieces and then we can both move it out of the way? Which do you like better?

[ Daphne catches the expression, the softening of his features, the look in his eyes, but pretends not to. She wonders if it is pity. ]

I was jesting about the leaves.

[ 😔

Pity it is.

If she has to pick.. ]

The latter, I suppose.

Oh, well, I'm not the smartest guy so that's why I couldn't pick up on such a fancy joke. C'mon, lets get this stuff cleared up so people can walk through here again. It isn't normally a disaster zone but we just had some...wild weather, let's say.

( It's more of a tree limb than a stick and for someone as petite as Daphne is, she'd given it a hell of a go trying to move it. As it is, he can tear logs apart, so it's nothing to lift one end of it and snap off a length of it, drop it to the ground, and then move to the next section. )

That accent of yours - you're English, yeah?

[ Daphne blinks.

One second, it’s a sizable tree branch over the length of herself. The next, it’s being made into sticks. Color her a little more than merely impressed, and maybe a little intimidated.

She swallows, realizes she’s staring, and tears her gaze up to meet his. ]

I am. I hail from London, and… you? Are you from here?

Here? No. I don't think anyone is from here. We all end up here because of the fox. I'm from Brooklyn. How much do you know about America? It's in New York.

( Bucky has more or less figured out that she's from before his time but he hasn't pinpointed the year yet. The cut of her dress tells him it might be regency but that's a big span of years and he isn't just going to pull out a number and either a) be wrong or b) be right and scare the shit out of her because he is. Most people don't enjoy his particular brand of eidetic memory.

Still, with the dress and the accent, she's probably got money, and that means she probably knows geography even if she's never traveled anywhere. It's a fair assumption, anyway, he thinks. )

A long way from London. I've been there before, though.

That can’t be true. Someone must be native.

[ She sounds less sure of that herself, but it seems a reasonable guess. No place could be devoid of people, could it?

Daphne has thus far led a very sheltered, though privileged life, but not one that has ever left the perimeters of England. She’d never so much as traveled across the channel. ]

New York? In the colonies? I know a little. My brother Colin has always wanted to travel there, though perhaps after he conquers the rest of Europe. [ She’s rambling, she belatedly realizes, and blames it on some relative discomfort. Everything is so new to her, including this man by the name of Bucky. ]

When were you in London? [ She’s begun to study his clothing - it doesn’t look anything like what she is accustomed to. ]

I'm pretty sure you won't believe me but I was shipped out to England to fight a war in 1943. London was my first stop but I ended up all over by the end of it - France, Germany, Italy. Being a soldier is not the way to see the world.

( He imagines someone like Daphne would never have to worry about that. The war hasn't happened yet for her and it'd be even longer still until women would serve in combat. It's not something she'd ever experience first hand unless her world had a different history than his (it's possible. everything is possible here). )

I would have rather gone when it was a vacation.

... Oh.

[ That. Is a lot, yes. But it’s not really anymore than the fact she’s been taken from London and transported to another world, or universe, or that there was a speaking fox. Her head is spinning over all of it still. ]

You’re from the .. future?

Yeah, pretty far in the future. Even further in the future than my own time because of...circumstances. That's probably a lot to explain at once, though, so we'll just leave it at the future. You're not the first person from the past I've met.

( Maybe he doesn't want to dump his entire sordid history on someone he's just met but it's easy enough to admit he's from the future and that there's other people from different time periods all thrown in together. He figures she'll learn that sooner rather than later anyway so she might as well hear it from him. )

Some things are consistent no matter when you're from. There's always soldiers like me, there's always beautiful women like you. Time and circumstances can't change everything.

[ Not unused to flattery in the way of her appearance, she isn’t fazed. If it weren’t for the info dump, she might have thanked him for the compliment. As it is, she’s been handed much to process.

After a couple of moments, complete with more blinking and a sharp exhale, she thinks to ask: ]

I see. Have you been here long?

A few months. It isn't long enough for me to be used to it by any stretch but at least I have a place to call home for as long as I'm stuck here and I know some people. When did you show up?

( Bucky doesn't think he's seen Daphne around and if she's shocked by someone from the future, she's probably new, but it isn't a good idea to assume something like that. Maybe she's only met their collection of people from the past. )

If you need help with things other than moving debris, I can probably point you in the right direction.

Six hours, I believe? This... device tells time. [ She brings out her relic from a small pocket in her gown, a pocket that had certainly not been there before in her own world. Pockets in dresses? How strange, but useful. Eloise would love it. ]

A few months? Do people usually only get stuck here for that length of time?

Some people have been here longer than that, I think. I can't speak from first-hand experience but I think this place has been taking people for far longer than I've been here and it's going to continue doing it. It's always a tantalizing prospect to run away from your problems.

( Six hours. She doesn't even know how to get around, doesn't even know the scope and size of this place. Bucky had spent days traveling all over to see how big it was, to press at the borders and see where his steps took him. He doesn't know that everyone does that or that Daphne will want to do it. )

Do you need anything? Food, place to sit down, a world without debris littering the road?

I suppose you’re right.

[ Was that why she had followed the fox? Maybe. Probably. She doesn’t particularly want to think about that right now, she finds.

He does get a small laugh out of her for the last part, but her expression turns gentle. ] You’re very kind to offer, but I could not burden you any more than I already have. [ With a gesture to the tree branch now made into practically a pile of twigs. ]

( Bucky glances at the branch that has become kindling and laughs a little. As if that was actually difficult? He's physically enhanced and has a vibranium arm on top of it; that is probably the least exerting thing he'll do all day. Still, to a regular person, it probably does seem like a lot. He's used to that reaction.

He shakes his head. )

That is not actually a burden for me. They build them different where I come from - or me, anyway. I could put you on my shoulder and run a marathon without even breathing heavy so I don't think buying you lunch and telling you where things are is really going to be too taxing.

[ A surprised half-laugh wheezes out of her, the color rising in her cheeks, a pretty pink on the dimples of them. What a picture he paints. ]

That shall not be happening.

[ This place is so peculiar. She bites her lip and glances away. She has been engineered to look after her reputation, and she’s just narrowly avoided total social ruin, but she is now a married woman, and there is no Anthony here (as far she knows) to chaperone if she even required one. Plus, she is quite hungry. ]

It would be impolite to refuse. Very well. But you must let me pay you back in kind. [ Somehow. ]

Aww, well, I'll have to cart around a ten pound sack of potatoes instead because I bet you don't weigh any more than that. I gotta keep in shape somehow.

( The blush isn't lost on him but Bucky feels like that has more to do with when she's from and less to do with him. Still, he takes his wins where he can find them. When she agrees to letting him buy her something to eat but only if she can pay him back, he nods. )

I don't like owing a debt either. It makes perfect sense. You can pay me back once you've got on your feet here.

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