TEST DRIVE MEME!

[faderifting]

TEST DRIVE MEME

While in some alternate, tidier timeline, the War against the Elder One ended years ago, you're not in that timeline. It's 9:46, and there's a war raging in northern Orlais, where the Chantry, aided by the Inquisition, marshalling Orlais and the faithful of Southern Thedas into a new Exalted March against the army of demon-bound Wardens, Red Templars, Venatori loyalists, and darkspawn Corypheus has amassed over the last four years. Rifts are still scattered across the continent, periodically spitting out strangers from strange worlds with green-glowing anchors embedded in their hands. There's no Herald of Andraste to save Thedas. Someone else is going to have to do it.

You're part of (or allied with, recently hired by, imprisoned by, etc.) a new organization that's an offshoot of the Inquisition, dubbed Riftwatch, that consists mainly of the otherworldly new arrivals, rebels and Wardens, and other people who want to prevent the apocalypse without necessarily marching under the Chantry's banner to do it. Their headquarters is an island fortress called the Gallows—formerly a Circle of Magi, more formerly a prison for slaves, but its new occupants have done a good job removing the more grotesque reminders of that past and making the place livable.

Maybe you're here because you want to help. Maybe you need the money (though there isn't much of it). Maybe you acquired an anchor and sticking around is the only way to prevent your hand from falling off. Maybe you've been sent by the Chantry or some other entity to keep an eye on everyone—they're rumored to be a lot of weirdos and troublemakers. Or maybe you're a new rifter and just going where the nice people with swords tell you that you need to go.

OOC: We post Test Drives fairly infrequently! But current players are strongly encouraged to track new top-level comments to the post so they don't miss new arrivals, and new folks should not be shy about commenting just because the post has been up for a while.

I. KIRKWALL: Even when enormous evil darkspawn are trying to take over the known world and you and your colleagues might be the only ones who can truly stop him, you can't work all the time. And when you aren't working, Kirkwall is there for you, with its dingy Lowtown taverns, its flashy Hightown establishments, its market stalls and street musicians and underground network of old mining tunnels inhabited by the disenfranchised and a few violent criminals. Or maybe you can work all the time, and you're in the city to do some official shopping, keep an eye on a suspicious character, or show a potential financial backer a good time. The city is grey, cold, and in places vaguely sinister—but it's home.

II. SUNDERMOUNT: North of Kirkwall lies the highest peak of the nearby mountain range. In more ancient days it was rumored to be the site of unspeakable horrors, but at present prowled by more speakable horrors, like possessed skeletons, shadow warriors, and the rare revenant or varterral. And you've been sent to prowl along with them, inside the winding caves that cut through the peak or over the snow currently coating the paths that wind around it. The reasons vary: maybe you're in search of medicinal herbs, maybe you're tracking a party of suspicious travelers lurking outside Kirkwall, or maybe you just took a wrong turn off the road trying to travel in or out of the city.

III. ORLAIS: Further south, Orlais is weathering the winter and the invasion of its northern territories in its usual style—which is why you're here, in a snow-blanketed manor just outside Val Royeaux, representing Riftwatch at the invitation of a gathering of masked nobility who have gathered to discuss ways to support the war effort while not starving their serfs and alienages. And to play parlor games. Maybe have an occasional chamber concert. Your role may be to actively participate in the planning, or it may be to be charming and noncommital while observing, or it may be to provide an example of a well-behaved rifter/elf/mage/Qunari/Fereldan. Regardless: your best behavior is expected, but that doesn't mean you can't sneak into the Duchess' very well-appointed library at night or slip away to try sliding down the length of a frozen reflecting pool in the gardens.

IV. THE FRONT: Riftwatch is no longer part of the Inquisition or directly engaged in the war that it, the Chantry's faithful Exalted Marchers, and Orlais are fighting against an invading Tevinter and Ander force in northern Orlais. But frequently enough, Riftwatch's business—delivering helpful intelligence, spending quality time with prisoners of war that might have information, assisting soldiers with a rift they've found too close to their camps, or passing through on the way somewhere else—requires passing near or through the frontline drawn through northern Orlais and now northern Nevarra, where it's possible to encounter enemy bands of dracolisk-mounted soldiers, fire-throwing mages, or particularly nasty darkspawn with red lyrium growing from their bodies.

V. SEND A MESSAGE: Each member of Riftwatch (or rifter, or ally) is assigned a blue crystal, small enough to wear around the neck, that can transmit voice messages, as well as an enchanted book tied to that crystal that can be used to exchange written messages. They're secure enough to discuss the war, if you'd like to get down to business, but loosely controlled enough to ask a question or play a game with only a few rolled eyes from people who hate fun.

VI. WILDCARD: From the Gallows' library to the pirate islands off the coast, from Hightown's high-priced market stalls to the bloody frontlines of the war, Thedas is yours to explore.

Comments

[icasm]

Right. Well.

[ He should probably put this poor man out of his misery, right? Right. ]

I'm sorry to inform you I am not the man you think I am; I fell out of a rift upon my arrival here and have never been to your... almost quaint world before.

[altusimperius]

You are a Rifter.

[Spoken in wonderment, more to himself than to the crystal's recipient.]

How is that possible?

[More quietly,] is there an Alexandrie as well, where you came from?

[icasm]

Many things are possible. Fewer things are probable. More than one Loki is both, it would seem.

[ He knows that's true, though. ]

No, there is no Alexandrie where I come from.

[altusimperius]

[It's unusual for this to strike Benedict as sad, rather than giving him a vindictive thrill; perhaps he's changed more than he thought. It gives him pause.]

Well.

[A bit awkwardly,]

Welcome.

[icasm]

Thank you.

[ Poor Benedict Artemaeus sounds a little sad. ]

Did you have any stories of magic to share?

[altusimperius]

[A pause. It's nice that someone in the world doesn't know how pathetic of a mage he can be.]

I set my rug aflame by accident, when I was studying primal magic.

[It's anticlimactic.] My tutor put it out.

[icasm]

...Ah.

[ A volume spoken in one word. Mostly the immediate presumption that Benedict is a) bad at stories, b) possibly bad at magic, or c) all of the above.

Granted, he's set fire to more than a rug in his time, but he'd usually managed to handle it himself. ]

[altusimperius]

[Off to a great start, it seems-- Benedict rolls his eyes to himself.]

...I also confounded a dragon, making it easier to kill with swords. But that's neither here nor there.

[There, confidence. Right? Something like that.]

Why do you want to know?

[icasm]

Now that sounds like a story. How did you do it?

[ Right. Confidence! ]

Because magic interests me and the rules are different, here.

[altusimperius]

Entropic magic is all about... well. Psychological torment, to put it bluntly. Misdirecting and wearing your enemy down. Invoking hopelessness.

[Even on dragons.

Should he be saying this stuff aloud?]

When done correctly, it makes a person untouchable.

[icasm]

That's very interesting. [ He's sincere about this. ] So you invoke this feeling of hopelessness in a dragon which makes it a lot less likely to be able to land an attack, yes? Are some dragons stronger of mind than others?

[ Bene probably shouldn't be saying all this aloud on an open forum, but Loki doesn't care what commoners think of magic. ]

[altusimperius]

I suppose I wouldn't know, as I've only fought the one.

[He pauses to reflect.]

...it's different from a person, though. Denser, but easier to manipulate once you've got in.

[icasm]

Well I suppose that makes sense; dragons aren't known for their abilities to reason, here.

[altusimperius]

Perhaps not. But High Dragons are still of an intelligence greater than most animals, to the point where they're considered sacred to some.

[And disposable to others, but that's the world for you.]

[icasm]

Only to some? [ Loki tsks. ] Unfortunate.

[ For the dragons, surely. ]

Is Confounding your only skill in the varied Entropy wheelhouse, or do you possess others?

[altusimperius]

I do.

[He hesitates.]

But that's best discussed in person, I think. [SOME people might get UNCOMFORTABLE]

[icasm]

Easily done, I've been told I'm stuck on this island for a week before I can even see the city properly.

[altusimperius]

Well in that case.

Lunch in the dining hall?

[icasm]

The one where there are actually people cooking and not the other, emptier one, I presume?

[altusimperius]

Yes, the one that has food.

[icasm]

Since I doubt I look much different from one world to the next I'll just wait for you to find me then.

[ He'll be found sitting more or less in the middle of the dining room, with a mug of tea and a book, which he is reading rather slowly. ]

[altusimperius]

[It's probably obvious who the voice on the other end was, based on how the young man who just entered pauses to stare in disbelief at the sight of someone he both does and doesn't know.

Words leave him, and momentarily he's an awkward twelve year old looking across the ballroom at the handsome teenage second son of House Asgard, with all the social prowess that implies.

Maybe this was a bad idea.]

[icasm]

[ It's the staring; Loki has a sixth sense for when people are staring at him, so he looks up from his place in the book (it's a copy of The Journal of Enchanter Wilhelm, by the by), takes in Benedict's slightly gobsmacked expression, and decides this is him.

Loki rises to his feet.

There are no cameras, no photographs of what Loki of House Asgard of Tevinter looks like, but Loki imagines it is a sight more similar to himself than the look Sylvie has taken on for herself.

If Benedict is just going to stand there, well. The party shall have to come to him, as they say. ]

I think, [ Loki begins, moving to put arm around Benedict's shoulders and turn them both back towards the door and outside, ] that perhaps the dining hall is too crowded for the nature of the conversations we may need to have, yes? You look rather as if you've seen a ghost.

[altusimperius]

I suppose I-- have, [Benedict stammers, his face flushing from tan to a darker red, possibly from the weight on his shoulders alone.

What a disaster.]

There's a room-- I've got-- um, upstairs, [he motions instead of trying to continue talking.]

[icasm]

Ah, upstairs, [ Loki says with more bravado than he feels, because sincerely? Fuck the sheer amount of stairs in this place, he's never felt so in need of a breath in his long life than he did at the top of the former Mage tower earlier. ] Hopefully not too far up, hmm? [ But Benedict has gestured and so Loki turns them in the direction of that gesture, keeping his arm where it is. ]